Bird Watcher

Bingo. Perfect food source. One non-native fish feeding on another high protein non-native that has no natural predators and is replenished through stockings by the state. Perfect! And boy oh boy, think about the recreation dollars if there were 50 lb stripers in Taney. Perfect temperature range...I'm telling ya, I think it would be dynamite.

I would be willing to bet that stripers would do well in a fishery like Taneycomo. Would anyone have a problem if they were stocked in there?

I think you misunderstood me. I don't mean that these trout are easy to catch. Look, Blue wilderbeast on the 777 ranch in Texas are hard to hunt, but they are from Africa. So are scimitar horned Orex, but they are from the middle East. It doesn't mean they are easy, just a little out of place. I think it's neat that you can go hunt them without buying a passport, but at least to me, the whole experience is cheapened a little by the location of the encounter. That's all I am saying. I never meant it to come out as "trout are easy to catch". Not my intent at all.

I have thought about this many times myself. I agree that trout probably do not directly compete with many of the native species, but the fact remains...They are not native. That is why I have so much more respect for the 5lb smallmouth out of a river than I do for the 5lb trout out of Taneycomo. Let me be clear....Not the angler who caught it, the fish itself. It's still tough to catch either one. I just really like seeing an old, mature, native fish. I really like to see Big Flatheads from Rivers, Big crappie from rivers, Turkeys from places like Camden County where they haven't been supplemental stockings. I like seeing big Ozark Whitetails from Mark Twain, I like that the fact that there are Elk on the Buffalo River again. I don't know, I guess what I am trying to say is I personally get a huge thrill out of seeing things the way they are supposed to be, they way they have always been. There is less and less of that the older I get. To me, there will always be a little bit of a "high fence" feel to trout in Missouri. They are neat, I'm glad they are available, but "they're not from around here, ya know?"

You can get the carpet from Bass Pro, Cabelas or any online boating supply store. Just google it. http://www.basspro.com/webapp/wcs/stores/s...__SearchResults

I thought the exact same thing when I saw the picture, "little hybrid" the way you describe it hitting and fighting is more like a hybrid too. I'm sure Bill Butts on this site could tell you for sure if you PM him.

Right on. I was just wondering if it was for something specific.

Bill, I didn't see the right signature on the graph for dropping baits last night, at least what I look for. I always look for thos classic "christmas tree" schools when I am going to drop down on white bass. I may not have been looking deep enough or maybe I was looking too deep. It seemed to me that the thermocline was sitting somewhere around 24', I think. I don't really remember. I was doing a lot of looking on the rolloffs between 22-29', but I wasn't seeing what I was looking for. In the process of looking, all of the sudden the fish came up all around us. It was a classic spot, inside channel bend in about 12-18' FOW with 50' right next to it. Pretty simple presentation. 3" pearl sassy shad with 1/8 oz. jig head. You could also use a maribou, I just like the plastic. I like to jig it fast just under the surface while the whites are on top. Hold the rod tip at 11 o'clock and think like a shad that has been cut out of the school and is fleeing solo. When the fish go back down, I lower my rod tip down to about 4 or 5 o'clock and use a slow steady retrieve. Let the jig get down to about 7'-10' and just swim it. One other thing is, those fish like to hit the bait multiple times, especially when they are deep. don't set the hook until you feel your rod loading up. Often you will feel them "bump" it 3, 4, 5 times before they eat it. BTW, Your Table Rock shad were skeeeny! The fish were yakking shad all over the boat. They were mostly 2-3"ers, so it might help to downscale your bait a little bit. Longwinded enough for ya?

incredible. Lucky guy.

I have a really good longtime friend who built a house in Owl Creek last Spring. He has been trying to get me to come down there for awhile now, but it just seems like I always have plans somewhere else, or he has a house full of family. Well, I called him this afternoon and he was just hanging around so I decided to head that way. I thought I might as well take the boat and we could sneak in a couple hours of fishing. I had read Babler's report about all the white bass in the White River and thought that would be perfect thing to try out for a little bit. After a little bit of looking at a few inside channel bend roll offs, I still hadn't seen anything that looked like White Bass when I graph them over at Grand. I shouldn't have worried. Bill was right, if you keep looking you'll see them on the jump and you won't even have to guess. We found about 3 acres of them coming up just down from Big M and had a ball with them for about an hour. I even caught a keeper LM and a spot in with them. It was a lot of fun and my buddy had a good time. It might be another year or two before I fish Table Rock again, but it was a fun evening. Thanks for the heads up, Bill.

I have stopped counting how many trips I have made to Stockton to attempt to catch walleye. They just always seem to have my number when I am targeting them. I catch plenty of them crappie fishing, some bass fishing, but it has become a little bit of a joke with my family when I say I am going walleye fishing at Stockton. Someone was always catching them Yesterday, on a different part of the lake, but not me. Well today was different. Dad and I didn't have a livewell full of keepers, but we did catch plenty of walleye and we were even fishing for them. We probably had 20-30 in the 12-14" range, but only had one 19" keeper. That was great with me. I went to Stockton to catch walleye and I did. I couldn't have done it without reading posts from both of you. As a matter of fact I found this forum by googling "Walleye, Stockton Lake" looking for information after a particularly frustrating trip 2 or 3 years ago and lo and behold a fishing report from Marty showed up. I'm sure some will read this and think "Why is this knucklehead going on and on about catching one keeper?". I don't know, after awhile I started to feel like Don Quixote going to slay windmills when I head to Stockton to catch walleye, but thanks to you guys I caught some today.

I think catfish are best when bled out. The meat changes from pink to white when you clean them and I think tastes a lot better. I wait until I am about to leave the lake and clean fish, then I cut the throat where the gills attach. The fish will be snow white and dead in about 10 minutes. FWIW.

Isn't that the truth? If you really want to kill a bite, just take someone who doesn't get to go much and be sure to tell them ahead of time how many you caught yesterday and how good it shoud be today.

just curious, What type/where are you fishing that you use the graph out of the Kayak?

good for him. It's a pretty fish and he looks happy with it.

Zander, I shoot a mod. for almost everything. The only time I might switch to imp. is on close ducks and geese. Steel patterns tighter than lead so sometimes you really need to open it up when you are shooting birds in your face in order to keep from damaging them too much.

The birds I have been keeping tabs on doubled or tripled in strength during the last cold snap. I am a little nervous about the cool weather this weekend though. it is just going to be a question of how many show up vs. how many leave. They are definitely migrating right now. I uncased the gun last night. The fall hunt is about to begin! Tell the fish I will see them next February.

just used it. Thanks bud, didn't know where it was on this forum.

Sorry mouth breather, No credit card for you. No offense, but I don't want a bunch of unauthorized charges for Enzyte and late night pay per view showing up on the bill. No can do on the gentleman's club either. I never feel right interrupting a man's family time like that...even your's. Let's just meet at the ramp. Go get your borrowed boat and a bucket of shad and let's do this. Don't keep me waiting...I am already excited thinking about it. I know you need the money, don't you want the business?

Or probably Martha's vineyard. Listen up window licker, I'd like to hire you. Where can I send the check? p.s., please send pics of Sonar. Thanks Sport.

obviously your elders didn't discourage you when you told them you wanted to be the world's biggest DB when you grew up. Why should these kids dreams be shattered when you were free to realize yours?

What an internet troll wannabe. Your tactics are amateur. Go back to the drawing board. Come back when you can bring some game, Paul Dallas impersonator.

I wish I knew how many trout I have caught on crappie jigs over the years, especially rubber tube jigs where legal.

I would try to target the area around where the water is running in from the creek. There is nothing that catfish like as much as fresh, new, running water and all of the morsels it brings with it.

I have heard a LOT of reports of people catching them this year, but 690,000 fish is a ton of fish. I mean when you compare that number to what AGFC stocks for stripers on Beaver. you could probably lose a couple hundred thousand downstream and never miss them. FWIW, I also saw one of the old fish last night while I was fishing. It was big and there is no mistaking that blue green color and the lines down the side when they blow past you.