Stockton Lake Guide Service

Just want to remind everyone to come out and fish this thursday at ruark bluff. Last week we had 12 boats and first place took 300.00 home with them. You can register at the dock up to 5;55 or so. We will be leaving at 6 pm sharp so be ready. let me know if you have any questions.

I have been catching some good fish during the day up sons creek in 12-19' on channel drops going to try the night thing tomorrow night so give me a call and I will let you know how I do.

Results from a bass tournament held at ruark bluff on 08-07-08: 1st Place-Tim Johnson, Morrisville and Vic McQuay, Boliver 5 fish 15.76 lbs 2nd Place-Josh Willis, Golden City and Tom Bittick, Golden City 4 fish 10.13 lbs 3rd Place-Vic Probert, Golden City and Les Brazil, Golden City 3 fish 7.18 lbs Big Bass Johnson and McQuay 6.66 lbs In all 11 boats caught 23 fish which were all released alive. Congrats to the winners for an awesome bag of fish. Next tournament is Thursday August 15 at 6 pm at Ruark Bluff. You can register at the ramp or go to www.fishstocktonlake.com for more details. Lots of short fish being caught. We had at least 10 fish that were over 14", but only two that kept. Come on out next thursday and fish with us. Great way to get to know people and get ready for the 2009 season. So far we have had 3 tournaments and new winners every week. Remember during this hot weather to keep some ice in the boat for your livewells and keep you pump on recirculate. Don't pump fresh water into the livewell all day. Hot water does not absorb O2 like cooler water, so to keep your fish healthy add ice and recirculate!! See you all next Thursday and thanks for another great week!!

Bass are biting very good on plastic baits and jigs lake wide. I have been catching fish in 5=10 foot of water on steep banks and bluffs, points and secondary points. I have talked with others that are saying they are fishing in 15 foot of water to get thier fish. I think the secdret is to fish both and change baits to see what they are wanting to hit. If you are not catching anything, change locations would be your best bet. The lake is full of short fish right now and if you are having trouble catching these fish then try moving into some coves and findign shad. Throw a small crankbait at them. If you stll are not having any luck give me a call and I will try to give you some help on finding some fish. Remember to keep your livewell water about 5 degrees cooler than the lake. and keep your recirculate pumps on. Don't pump hot lake water on top of the fish all day, it will stress the fish and could kill the fish. Crappie. I found a large school of crappie up the sons creek arm today. I am going back tomorrow to see if they are still biting. Try fishing brush piles about 15 foot deep with jigs and minnow. Move around from pile to pile to locate good numbers and sizes of fish. Walleye have slowed a little, but still biting pretty good. jigs tipped with a night crawler is all you need to get a limit. Catfish are excellent on flats in 8-14 foot of water using fresh shad. Just let the wind blow your boat and hang on. Should be no trouble finding these fish. Hope this helps you find some fish if you need anything please feel free to give me a call and good luck!!

Results from a bass tournament held at ruark bluff on 08-07-08: 1st Place-Tim Johnson, Morrisville and Vic McQuay, Boliver 5 fish 15.76 lbs 2nd Place-Josh Willis, Golden City and Tom Bittick, Golden City 4 fish 10.13 lbs 3rd Place-Vic Probert, Golden City and Les Brazil, Golden City 3 fish 7.18 lbs Big Bass Johnson and McQuay 6.66 lbs In all 11 boats caught 23 fish which were all released alive. Congrats to the winners for an awesome bag of fish. Next tournament is Thursday August 14 at 6 pm at Ruark Bluff. You can register at the ramp or go to www.fishstocktonlake.com for more details. Lots of short fish being caught. We had at least 10 fish that were over 14", but only two that kept. Come on out next thursday and fish with us. Great way to get to know people and get ready for the 2009 season. So far we have had 3 tournaments and new winners every week. Remember during this hot weather to keep some ice in the boat for your livewells and keep you pump on recirculate. Don't pump fresh water into the livewell all day. Hot water does not absorb O2 like cooler water, so to keep your fish healthy add ice and recirculate!! See you all next Thursday and thanks for another great week!!

Get yourself a mess of king snakes and they will eat all of the other snakes, even venomous ones and they are not going to hurt you. That is what they feed on is other snakes, of course then you might start having a rodent problem, but the snakes will be gone. Or a better idea is just go fishing and forget about snakes unless they fall in your boat and then it adds a little excitement to the fishing trip.

Last week all the fish lived and that is a good thing. At least as far as I could tell when I released them. I was out the next morning at 6 and looked around, didn't see any dead fish but guess you really never know. This week, please bring a bag of ice to help cool the water in your livewells. Hot surface temp lake water does not hold enough O2 to keep fish alive. As you pump lake water into the livewell you are actually hurting the fish more than helping them. Even if you leave your recirculate pump running nonstop, you still run the risk of the fish sufficating. So please don't pump lake water into the livewells except to fill the livewell at the beginning. Once the livewell is full, start the recirculate pump, put enough ice in the live well to cool the water approx. 5 degrees, and keep the recirculate pump running. Also use rejuvanate to help the fish with their slime coat and relax the fish. Don't cool the water to fast as this could shock the fish and harm it also. Add just enough ice to lower the temp about 5 degrees. In extremely well oxygenated water, the oxygen content is only 8 to 12 parts per million (PPM). Your bass will begin to suffocate when livewell oxygen levels fall below 6.5 PPM. Standard livewell aeration systems use the 21 percent atmospheric air to replenish the livewell oxygen. Unfortunately, oxygen and water do not mix well, especially during hot weather. Therefore, the "recycle" pumps are not very efficient at mixing oxygen into the water. Even with the best "recycle" pumps, livewell oxygen levels will drop below 6.5 PPM when the water temperature increases above 90 degrees. Add ice to this equation and leave the recycle pump running and you can increase the O2 level to up to 12 ppm and save that fish. If you are fishing shallow water, remember that the surface temp in 5 foot of water might be 90 degrees or better. Pumping this water into your livewell can easily kill you fish. Try to fill the livewell with water from the middle of the lake and then add your ice etc. We had a great tournamnet last week and things are looking really positive to get this thing going on a larger scale. We will be fishing this week till 9:15 pm incase you don't hear the announcment. If you don't understand about the recirculate method to keep the fish alive, please take a look at the BASS site or google something to learn what you need to do to keep them alive. DON'T FORGET WE DON'T WEIGH DEAD FISH ON THURSDAY NIGHTS SO YOU MUST WORK HARD AT KEEPING THEM ALIVE. If you have any questions or comments on ways you KNOW will help us keep these fish alive, feel free to post something on here. Good luck and see you all on Thursday. One last thing, If you would like to use your boat to release fish, let me know at the end of the tournmant and we can switch off each week.

I'm keeping them in my livewell for this week. I need some help if you didn't notice LOL Really I drove out of ruark and dropped them about 200 yards west of the bridge in the middle of the lake. All of them looked healthy except for the 6 lb fish. I picked it back up, iced my water down and doctored up the water for about 20 minutes. it looked better when I released it and I think it swam deep which is a good sign. See you all thursday night. I just talked to the winners and told them they were starting 7 lbs in the hole to give the rest of us a chance. His reply was "thats all" Somebody needs to beat them this week!!

Results from the Thursday evening tournament held out of Ruark Bluff. 1st place: Leland Heath and Rodney David 5 fish 14.48 lbs. (And they admitted to culling 4 fish) 2nd place: Tim Johnson and Vic McQuay 3 fish 10.84 lbs 3rd place: Nathan Grant and Carl Cox 4 fish 9.66 lbs Big Gass: Johnson and McQuay 6.17 lbs. The second thursday tournament went off great. We had 10 boats, 8 of which weighed fish! Total we caught 21 fish, all of which were released alive. Don't miss next thursday!! We leave out of Ruark at 6 pm and will fish till 9:15 pm.

Stockton Lake guide service is hosting a thursday evening tournament on stockton. 40.00 entry includes big bass buddy format 100% payback. getting lots of interest in fishing these. they will go thru august then pick up next spring. Try to be at the ramp by 5:45 latest or text me at 417-234-8988 if you will be late. It's going to be lots of fun, the more boats, the more money we pay. 1-7 payout

Ive been told but can't remember. That really helps you. I will try to find out from a friend of mine with dnr and get back with you. It's buggin me too since I used to know what it was from. Don't forget to fish this thur 6 pm out of ruark!!

they were not on fire, but we got some good fish around sons creek. Also caught them down by the dam and around mutton creek over the weekend. Took some kids out that had never walleye fished before and they had fun. Here is a pic if I can get it to work

there were lots of fish caught, but just not many keepers. I had one that went 14.99, but couldn't make it measure. We need more boats to make this thing happen, so help us talk it up and get some guys on the lake!!

If you like to bass fish stockton lake, don't forget to show up thursday evening at 6 pm to fish the thursday evening tournaments. Last week it only took 3.22 lbs to win the tournament. 2.22 lbs took 2nd place. The more boats that show up, the more money and places we can pay. 100% payback!!! If you would like some more information, give me a call or take a look at the web site. Thanks! www.fishstocktonlake.com

OK, everything is ready to go. We have the weigh in bags, scales, release boats, and everyone should be ready to start fishing this Thursday at 6 pm. I will be at the ramp at 5 pm to register people and get things set up. More information is on my website at Get tournament info here I am really looking forward to meeting eveyone and getting this tournamnet off the ground. If you are positive you are fishing this thurs shoot me a quick email at click here to send me an email so that I will have some idea how many boats to expect. We will leave promptly at 6 pm, ready or not. If you are running late, shoot me a text message (service is bad at this ramp) and let me know what is up. Really looking forward to having a great tournmament so everyone needs to try to get out and fish this Thursday. Thanks,

Been fishing the past week and things seem to keep getting better. Walleye are biting very good on main lake points in 20 foot or less water on jigs with night crawlers. you can either use the trolling motor or drift over the points. Caught limits the past two days in 2 hours or less, so if you don't get bit move onto another point. You will probably catch several drum and a few catfish while fishing for the walleye, but that just keeps things interesting. Bass are biting good on small crankbaits, grubs, and topwater on points. The topwater bite is getting better and the fish are getting a little bigger. We caught a 4lb kentucky today (but we were walleye fishing). Watch the banks for bass feeding on the shad. The topwater bite is going pretty much all day if it is cloudy. With the full moon coming up, the night bite should be excellent. Crappie are not doing as good (at least not where I have been fishing. With the way the lake has been dropping, the crappie I was catching have slowed down alot. If you are wanting to catch crappie I would concentrate on points and brush piles in 20 foot or less. I did talk to a group trolling this morning that said they were catching crappie, white bass, and walleye on small crankbaits. I saw them boat one walleye so it at least appeared that they were telling the truth. Don't forget that the Thursday evening bass tournaments start on July 24th. Should be lots of fun and it's only $40.00 per boat!! Check out the website for more info and don't forget to keep your hook sharp.

Sounds good, so far had several say they were fishing. Looks like might be some pretty good competiton. I went out last night and we had a 3 1/2- 4 lb smallmouth on a zara spook. That would be nice for thursday nights!! See you there

If you enjoy bass fishing, but just don't have the time to do it enough. Come down and try the new Thursday Evening Bass Tournaments at Ruark Bluff. The tournaments start at 6 pm and end around dark. Its only $40.00 per team, includes big bass, and 1 in 7 boats wins money. Rules are already posted on my website, and more information will be posted next week. The first tournament is july 24th and they run thru the end of august. It's 3-4 hours of non-stop fun and the chance to win some money to go along with it. With a 100% payback for the remainder of this year it should be a big hit for all the bass fisherman. Starting in 2009, we will have 20 thurs night tournaments with each paying back 85%, the other 15% will be used for a fish off on a saturday in sept or oct. The more boats we get fishing, the more you can win, so tell everyone that likes to fish to be there July 24th. If you want to hold a spot, you can email me your information early. If you just want the next one in line, then you can sign up at the boat ramp with no penalty fee. If you want to see what type of fish can be caught in 4 hours or less, check out burtonsbaitandtackle.com Gary has put on these tournaments for years and it's not always easy to get into the money. Let me know if you have any questions and I will be at the ramp on the 24th at about 5 pm. Thanks!!

Lots of fish biting today/evening. White bass started surfacing, so keep an eye out for them around masters, ruark bluff, and flats etc around the lake. We caught some today around the rip rap at ruark, but heard some talk of lots of fish around masters and mutton creek. Bass are biting good on flats and points feeding on shad. Road runners, small crankbaits, and plastics seem to work the best during the day. Topwater baits are producing good bites if it's cloudy or during the evenings. Crappie are pretty slow during the day, but really good during the nights under lights with jigs and minows. If you like to sit still and minnow fish, try the bridge pillars and drown minnows after dark. If the fish turn on you can get a limit in a couple of hours. The best day bite I have found has been around the dam off main lake points on small crankbaits and roadrunners. Walleye are biting good, then fair, then good, depending on what day it is. It's one of those "you should have been here yesterday" bites. Try rigs with nightcrawlers or small crankbaits on points. Thursday Tournament Information First Thursday evening tournament will be July 24th. Starts at 6 pm till dark. Buddy format, $40.00 per boat includes big bass. Pays 1-7. I will have more info on my website the first of next week. You can pay at the ramp or if you want a better boat number call or email me your info. 100% payback!!

well it looks like its a go. I have gotten enough emails and phone calls from people who say they are ready to fish it. I will post a schedule as soon as the permits are approved. The tournaments will be going out of Ruark Bluff at 6 pm on Thursday nights. We will fish till dark, or maybe a little longer. It will cost 40.00 per boat that will include big bass. Points will be based on lbs of fish caught and show up points. For the rest of this year we will have a 100% payback, 1 in 7 gets paid. Next year we will hold out 15% for an end of year 8 hour saturday tournament probably in October. This will be a great time for all of us to get together and talk fishing, have a little competition, and lots of fun. I look forward to meeting some of you so come on out and catch some fish!! Feel free to give me a call if you have any questions.

In an attempt to try to help some people out I have a limited time special going on my website for guide trips. If you are interested in taking a trip, take a look at the website first and give me a call. It's the best I can do and try to get some people on the lake that might not be able to make it otherwise. Thanks and good luck fishing!!

Well I have tried to send you 2 emails but they are not showing up that they were sent. I can take you out to look for brush piles. I have the new humminbird side imager on my boat, so finding brush piles is pretty easy. Shows up 100 yards off either side of boat. If you got the emails then I am sure you are tired of reading this same stuff, LOL. I am booked wed and thur (as long as the storms hold off) but have an opening friday anytime. My cell is 417-234-8988. Thanks.

OK all paperwork has been submitted and should be approved with no problems. The tournaments will start on July 24 at 6 pm leaving out of Ruark Bluff. Depending on the amount of daylight we will try to stay out until 9:15 pm. Weigh in will take place at Ruark Bluff. I will try to get some more info on my website over the next week or so. I have posted the rules, but I need to get the info up on it also. It will cost 40.00 per boat and that includes big bass. If anyone doesn't think this is enough time to catch fish, take a look at www.burtonsbaitandtackle.com and look at his thurs night tournaments. I think it took 16 lb last week. I have fished them for years and they are a lot of fun. Everyone needs to try a couple of them to see how they like it. Boat positions will be given on a first paid first out basis starting monday july 14. I should have entry forms on my site by then. There is NO LATE fees for entry. You can pay at the doc the night of!! As long as the wind is not blowing hard, we will leave at the no wake buoy, if the wind is blowing we will have to take off by the dock. All livewells must be checked and marked off before the tournament starts. Email me any questions etc this week. and hope to see you all there!! Thanks

We went bass fishing yesterday and it turned out to be a pretty good evening. Lots of fish around the dam in 12-20 foot of water on swim baits. Talked with some people walleye fishing and they said they had 2 keepers, and had lost one. They were fishing off points on the main lake. Sorry no report on crappie or catfish from yesterday.

Your on the right track. The rocks are probably your best bet. Try ruark bluff or if you don't mind making the trip the dam has been good fishing over the past couple of weeks. Everyplace else is covered with trees etc, and really tough to fish from the bank. Even most of the bluffs are far enough under that you can't fish them from land. If you make the trip to the dam, try fishing the east end. I was there last night and there were lots of fish there, but I was bass fishing. Didn't really try for crappie etc. Hope this helps and good luck!!