bigredbirdfan

I would like to keep expanding the baits I throw to get stale on using the same baits over and over again. I also like to learn new techniques and if fishing is tough maybe increase my chances of boating fish. Let me preface that I fish rivers and creeks and not lakes currently although I would imagine there is a lot of carryover. I would like any advice on colors for water conditions, times of the year, brush hog size and rigging options, best spinning gear set up and just any help or tips anyone is willing to share. I envision using these primarily around boulders and deeper water on bigger rivers but really haven't done in depth research except some internet searching which most of what I find is lake fishing.

TY. I get on read some but haven't posted or commented in awhile.

Well I haven't had it out yet due to monsoon season. I was on the river two weeks ago (5/27) and couldn't buy a bite on a crawdad pattern and didn't see any either. Switched to a baitfish pattern and caught about 20 fish.

Can someone tell me when and what water temperature crawfish come out of hibernation and go into it?

10-12 no pictures

What stretches are float able if you don't mind me asking?

Can anyone tell me what minimum flows and gage heights are on the beaver at bradleyville and possibly desirable levels?

I was really happy that some craft is making it's way into cans for the rivers. One can only drink so much regular beer in the summer. My favorite for that has been the New Belgium Citradelic, but now we are transitioning into fall so I'm finishing that up to make room in fridge. The Oskar Blues beers in cans were good this float year as well. All purpose go to is Coors Banquet. I just finished my primary fermentation of some local apple cider but it will probably be near Thanksgiving before I get to pop a bottle of that. As far as the hard liquors: Vodka: Titos and club soda with a lemon Bourbon: Old Charter on rocks splash of water (Basil Haydens is outstanding but expensive) Tequila: Sip on any good Respasado and if I find a little extra cash I will spring for an Anejo, Cenntenial and Cazadores are my favorites currently.

The beautiful little girl who died (Chole Butcher) was a friend of mine's daughter. She wasn't "playing" or "goofing around" on or around the dam. She came to the aid of a much younger and smaller swimmer who had been sucked into the giant hole in the dam and became trapped. She was able to free that girl but ended up losing her life in the process. She is a hero in my opinion. It's very easy to be opinionated about this subject when it wasn't YOUR child killed needlessly because 1) Dawt Mill was negligent in preventing it's own campers and swimmers from out of the area of danger and failing to repair a dam 2) Corps of Engineers was negligent preventing people from the area of danger. They haven't really been proactive protecting anyone. There could have been a rope like a swimming area on a lake warning people but they chose not to install one but managed to turn a small campground into a multi million dollar complex instead. I myself a healthy active middle age male felt uncomfortable getting my canoe over to their ramp with the amount of current sucking you down to that chute. I am also happy that dam is coming down because I want to float through it on down to the Bryant creek in Tecumseh and will now have that opportunity. As for stripers and trout as a smallmouth bass fisherman I could care less about them as well. Human life outweighs such topics in my mind.

http://www.house.mo.gov/BillActions.aspx?bill=HB2405&year=2016&code=R

http://openstates.org/mo/bills/2016/HB2405/#votes

You will be in big time trouble in something like that with the flood gates open my friend. I wouldn't even do that with 1 unit or less of generation and I'm not aware of shuttle services on tanyecomo.

What color and what area? I've had good success with even bigger Rogues with gates open. Big fish like big baits.

Well I will accept recommendation on open shoes as well as long as they clear gravel quickly and don't slip on mossy rock. I had a pair of TEVA White River Sandels once that probably were the best so far.

I have tried many different floating shoes and have yet to find any I really like. Just going to throw it out to ask everyone if there are products you really like. I have tried everything from old sneakers to sandels to river shoes with reallly nothing standing out. I would like something that keeps gravel out and has an non-slip sole on mossy rock. Any thoughts?

You should do some checking around on this forum website. It is my understanding that landowners own everything to the waters edge including gravel bars. I also believe they own the gravel under the water as well. The only thing that you have a right to is the water flowing through.

You floated from below Lake Springfield to Galena? It took you two days? Did you have any drag or obstructions?

What color on gitzits?

I have never floated Maumee to Hwy 14 bridge before. I was hoping someone can tell me what to expect as far as movement of water down that far as well as a few baits to take. Probably going to take two spinning rods and one baitcasting rod and reel. Any information is greatly appreciated as I don't want to take a bunch of tackle that I won't use.

What a shame. I'm sure the hellbender would like the river back where it was before this stupid dam was there. Now they can't migrate up above that dam becausee they have no way to portage above it. It might actually benefit them to have the dam slowly erode and be allowed to travel up stream. I'm probablly only going to float the extreme upper NFOW from here on out. By the time this commercial outfit is done developing there probably won't be much ecology down there period.

It's probably a waste of time to call anyone. Obviously someone who spends half a million dollars for a party cove on the river is connected politically anyway.

It has been reported on Dawt Mill's FB page that the dam is now not holding water and will need to be repaired. Is there anyway to voice oppostion to reparing the dam to govering authorities? I'm sure that the dam is their property but they will still need DNR and possibly Corps of Engineers permits to make these repairs. Is anyone else interested in being able to float this stretch without this impediment? The dam was originally for the functing of an operating mill which is not the case anymore and it is just a barrier to floater which only benefits the outfitter there that won't even let you use their ramp.

The only thing close that I can think of is the finley river. But they have restricted access at Lindenlure. You might check with MDC and see if there are public access places.

We floated from Hebron to Sunburst Ranch. That was a lot of water in two days especially given the headwind the second day. It took me several hours to figure out 90% of the tackle I brought was worthless. Forget pumpkin, green pumpkin, pumpkin seed and many others on this river. The only color that hooked up was watermelon seed. Any soft plastics in this color worked. We caught dozens of fish and probably would have caught more except for having to paddle past very fishy waters to get to a gravel bar to set up camp. We caught fish in slack before moving water, in moving water, in slack behind moving water and behind obstructions. I will note that a crawdad crankbait worked if you could keep it from hanging up on rocks or vegetation. I caught one tagged smallmouth 13 inches in length. Also, caught lots of small goggle eye nothing of any significant size and picked up one rainbow trout although we pretty much just floated that water without really fishing it. Had no hook ups on topwaters or countdown rapala. Really enjoyed the upper part of the river and will definitely be going again maybe in fall when partiers get off the water. We saw two boats on thurs and two boats on friday.

Unfortunately I had my two rods fall into the river this weekend. Does anyone have links to sites that show what I should do to them now that they have been submerged into the water. Spinning reels.