Champ188

What you do is take all of those waypoints and fish everywhere BUT there and you just might have a pretty good day.

Patrick, I am presently looking to sell my 2004 Champion 188 Elite. It's a 19-foot boat that rides like a 20-footer. Motor is a 2004 Mercury Optimax 200. In the past year, I've added a full set of new factory-original seats ($1,100) and just six weeks ago put a brand new MotorGuide Tour 82 trolling motor on it ($1,200). Both graphs also were purchased within the past 2 years and are Lowrance HDS 5's, one of which has GPS. The rig is sitting on a tandem-axle trailer with brakes. Carpet is good. Being the Elite model, it has all of the extras. This boat already knows Table Rock very well. Asking $17,000 firm. Here are a couple of pics.

Thanks F&F, will keep that in mind.

Great report, Fanatic. Nice to know that things are darn near identical in all three primary river arms (James, White and Kings). Gotta be steep and deep.

Funny how every time we think humanity has gone down the crapper for good, someone comes along and does something like sharing the crappie hole to restore our faith. Neat story, Sam. And you hit the nail on the head with your opening remark about all of us getting along regardless of our particular interest in fishing. Let's save our live ammo for the numbnutz recreational boaters and jet skiers instead of wasting it on each other.

Thanks Quill, we worked long and hard for 'em. They're still schooled up. We'd go an hour without catching one then hit a pack of 'em and catch 4-6 pretty quick. Enjoyed the day but doggone it I'm ready for one of those good ol' dark, windy, chunk-and-wind a spinnerbait from daylight to dark deals. Gotta be coming soon. We had a warm fall like this 4-5 years ago and just when I thought there wouldn't be a blade bite that year, they got on it around the first of December and chomped it til Christmas.

No wind + bright skies on The Rock = darn tough.

My hat is off to you, Ryan. That is truly taking the high road.

Hey Jacob, small world. Glad me and Donna weren't holding hands or doing some other embarassing monkeyshine. We fished til about noon when the big cold front and rain hit then I sissied out and suggested we call it. Donna didn't put up much of a fight. Glad you caught some. That's a darn good point you were fishing. Some good smallmouth get up on that gravel in early spring. Been known to catch some myself off of it and the one on the other side by the marina docks, at least til the marina dude comes out and runs us off.

Me and Donna did Big M on Sunday and found things about the same. We beat out a small derby limit (that being WE because running the trolling motor in gusts up to 40 mph has to count for something) but nothing to write home about. Donna caught all five keeps along with a fair number of shorts on 3/8-ounce jig on banks 45 degrees and steeper. Silly shad just will NOT seem to move into the creeks or pockets this fall, so no reason for the bass to do so either. Like op79 said, it's surprising to see them staying out in the big water suspended but by gosh that's where they are. Dang near every fish Donna caught was suspended 10-15 feet deep on nearly vertical rock. All of our keepers were spots except for one pretty good LM. As for the big dummy on the front, besides keeping his size 14 on the tm pedal, he was determined to force-feed em a spinner bait or buzz bait. Didn't work. Didn't care. Fun to watch Miss Donna whack em on the jig.

Nice report indeed, dwiebenga. Thanks for sharing. Glad you guys were able to crack the code and capture some of the slippery little devils.

F and F, I used the term "rules" loosely in reference to the unwritten rules that we all should follow regarding giving each other space on the lake. That goes for recreational and tournament anglers alike. And both groups have more than their share of ignorant and inconsiderate people.

Bill Jr., go fishing just like you normally would. The fact that you took time to ask this question shows that you are a considerate person ... maybe overly so in this age of overt rudeness on land and sea alike. Feathers and Fins, your indictment of tournament anglers is completely unfair. I am both a recreational angler and a tournament fisherman and I can assure you, I have been the victim of more than my share of blatant rudeness at the hands of recreational anglers just as often or more than by tournament fishermen. It's an epidemic that knows no boundaries. Some are ignorant of the rules, some are too ignorant to learn the rules and some just flat don't frackin' care .... if you are on their spot, they'll try to push you off. Stupidity and disregard for others are equal opportunity afflictions in today's society.

Don't fall out of the tree.

Just what I thought (hoped) was about to happen. Sounds like they're making a big move shallow.

Guess I need to change to something besides my substandard Shimano rods. I did buy a couple of the white Duckett MicroMagic rods last year and have been extremely happy with them. Very light, very sensitive and so far very durable. Plus, those itty bitty guides really help when sliding them into the tubes in the rod locker of my boat.

Pardon my laughing about the Chronarchs. Been there, done that. Just grateful that Donna came pretty much pre-trained on baitcasters when we met. I think you may have been about a week or two early for the start of the good fall bite. I may be wrong, but I think it's about to break loose. For me, it usually takes the weather getting cool enough that you have frost more mornings than not to get em going.

Good luck and let us know. Don't underestimate the chance of a shallow bite even after this front. Just might be a decent spinnerbait and Wart bite on the windy banks with bigger rock.

Hey Edwin, If your brother plays golf, you should take him up to Murder Rock. Of course, you may have played it before but it was a new experience for me and Donna a couple of weeks ago. Fantastic scenery, great golf course, nothing bad to say at all about the place.

Amen to both Jeremy and Bill. Guiding and derby fishing are polar opposites. One is all about quantity and the other all about quality. It's a rare fellow indeed who can pull off both. Yes, a lot of pro anglers started out as guides (Larry Nixon, Tommy Martin and Mark Davis to name a few). As I recall, Nixon and Martin even continued guiding after starting their derby careers. But that was in the 1970s and 80s when tournament fishing simply would not pay the bills regardless of how well a guy did. As BASS purses grew and daily tournament limits shrunk — first from 15 to 10, then 10 to 7, then 7 to the current 5 — Nixon, Martin and later Davis quickly learned that they had to stop thinking like guides and start targeting five quality bites a day.

To each his own but you don't want to throw 10-pound line in the places I throw my topwaters.

Everyone struggles sometimes, even KVD. Table Rock will do it to anyone. Rick Clunn once said, "These White River lakes kick my tail every time the sky turns blue and the wind dies." I'm sure KVD being the class act that he is would admit the same thing.

Cblaine, the only topwater lure that I really see gear ratio being a factor with is a buzz bait, and for that I use a 7:1 reel for the simple fact that my wrists and hands are getting old and just don't have the energy to try to keep one of those things on top with a slower ratio reel. That said, one of the best buzz bait fishermen I know showed me one time that it can be very important to run one slow as possible (and still keep it on top) at times, especially as the water cools into the 60s and 50s in the fall. You can still use a 7:1, just be sure to reel slower. You can also bend a little more cup in the blade to add lift while reeling slower. For a Spook, wake bait or popper, a good 6:3:1 or something in that neighborhood should work just fine.

You don't have to be an experienced fisherman to contribute to the conversation, Flippin. Glad to have you here.

Pretty good day by recent measures. Good report.