kayaker

Zack, Looks like you guys were fishing. Did you catch any fish? The Elk is my favorite river.

We stayed in a cabin at Riverside. Only one other cabin was taken and two pop-up campers were there. They had a great stretch of river right there at the resort, but the fishing was not very good there. Most of our luck came at Dam 3 and Lasseter. The Warm Fork River had muddy water flowing into the Spring River. Mark at the flyshop said it was muddier than normal. It was starting to clear when it rained again Saturday night and was muddier than ever. Too bad the Warm Fork has to enter the river right there at the beginning. Would have been nice if it joined the Spring about 10 miles downstream. We had planned to float on Saturday. There was 5 of us so I agreed to be the odd man out and float by myself in my Native Ultimate kayak. I was really excited and then my buddies chickened out on getting canoes because the water had a strong current and they were worried about tipping canoes.

Made my first trip to the Spring this past Friday and Saturday. Stayed at Riverside resort. What a nice looking place. Stopped in to see Mark Crawford at Spring River Flyshop, super nice guy, gave us lots of pointers. The river was flowing very strong and was pretty murky all weekend from some rain earlier that week. I thought the fishing was kind of slow. I hear it was really good the previous week. One of the those, "should have been here last week" things. We still caught fish, just not as many as we usually do on the White and North Fork. We like to wade and did not want to fight generation on those rivers. We always do an annual winter trip to Arkansas. My buddies and I are from the Kansas City area. I did like the looks of the Spring River and the ease of driving to different access points. I will have to give it a try again sometime and see if I can do better. Caught most fish on Y2K's, some on buggers and pheasant tails.

Well, I had already scheduled some vacation time for the second weekend in December for a pheasant hunt in Iowa, but that trip just got cancelled. I need to find some alternative plans and this nice weather in Kansas City is giving me the fishing bug. If the weather would be nice enough that weekend I am thinking about doing a winter time float and try some fishing. Does the Elk fish very well in December if the weather is fairly mild? Has anyone been fishing lately?

riverfish86, You are flat out tearing them up. What is your hot pattern and favorite lures this time of year. I thought the bass fishing would have slowed down. I pretty much give up on bass and start hitting the trout streams this time of year, but might try and do another bass trip.

Good job on cleaning some of those spotted bass out.

HERE

Thanks for the hospitality on Sunday, you and Jean Ann are great hosts. I really enjoyed hanging out and meeting everyone and making such great friends. My boys loved their gifts and cant wait to come down again. Glad you got those pictures up, nice fish. I hope you have a great trip on the Eleven Point.

I should be able to make it. I will bring my own boat. Do you know what time we would start cleaning (I have a 3 hour drive) and are we launching from Hog Heaven. Dang Jean Ann caught some hogs.

Took the boys to camp, fish, and float at Hog Heaven after the great trip I had there last time. We met some great new friends at camp to float with. The kids had a great time fishing, swimming, and floating together. They caught some really nice bluegill and bass. The bluegill went in the cooler for a fish fry and the bass went back in the river. They are starting to understand you let the bass go. They were more excited by the bluegill. Everytime they caught a bass they would say, "Oh, its just a bass, we have to let it go." I would sneak off by myself in the morning and at night and I caught some really nice fish. My darn computer will not let me upload the pictures so I will try and put them on later.

rps, I see you got the Native Ultimate. How do you like it? Where did you get yours? Have you tried fishing out of it yet and standing in it. I love mine, taking it back to the Elk River this week.

rps, PM sent on the boat.

Stayed at Hog Heaven Thursday and Friday night. My buddy and I drove down Thursday evening after work and set up camp. Russ and Jean Ann are great hosts. I will not stay anywhere else ever again when I go to the Elk River. We floated all day Friday from Hog Heaven to Mt. Shira. As we passed all the other over crowded crazy campgrounds I was glad we were not staying at any other those other places. Thanks to some advice from fellow forum member GloryDaze we got a lot of fish during the day fishing soft plastics wacky worm style. Nothing big but good numbers. We put all the goggle-eye and bluegill in the cooler and had an open fire fish fry back at camp. The highlight of the trip was the night fishing Friday night. I knew Russ has been throwing his "chug-bug" at night so I put a big pooper on my flyrod. Waded out at 9:00 and at the first dead-fall down from camp I layed into this big old hump-backed toad. He bent my flyrod in half trying to get back into the wood but luckily I put on a heavy leader and was able to keep him out. Here are a few pictures from the trip. Thanks again Russ and Jean Ann. I will be back with my two boys in a couple of weeks.

We spotted two huge birds of prey this weekend near your place when we were fishing. They were not bald eagles, we think they were osprey. I know they have seen them at Taneycomo. They for sure were not buzzards, we jumped them twice and got a close up view. They were bigger than bald eagles.

For those mentioning the Native Ulitmate 12, I just bought one and I love it. I have been fishing for 10 years out of my Old Town Loon 138. It has been a great boat for me, but the Ultimate blows it away. It is much more manueverable and lighter and you can stand up in it very easily. The first time you try standing it feels wobbly but you get used to it quickly. The secondary stability is great. You can remove and elevate the seat also which is great. It is a hybrid boat, paddles like a kayak but has the space of a canoe, that is how they designed it, to provide the space and storage of a canoe. I recently did a river trip where I floated down stream two miles fishing and paddled back up stream to the truck with now problems. I am taking it to the Elk River this week.

We are coming down from Lee's Summit, just outside of KC. Are you a KC guy. We will have to get a fishing report from you when we get in Thursday evening.

Glory Daze, My buddy and I will be there next Thursday and Friday also. We will get in Thursday evening after work, and Russ is going to shuttle us upstream with our kayaks to float back and fish Friday. So you there.

I have never stayed at Cedar Camp or met anyone from there. I just often put in or take out at the river there.

Took my brand new Native Ultimate 12 kayak down to the Little Niangua Friday for a one day trip. I knew that river would not be very crowded even though it was the 4th of July weekend. Also brought my dog (yellow lab) with me. Brought the fly rod and the spinning rod. Threw the spinning rod while in the kayak floating through the deeper sections fishing a finesse worm on a jig head. When I saw a good wading spot I would stop and get out and fly fish. Unfortunately the dog would often get down steam ahead of me and put the fish down when we stopped. Did manage to catch some smallies and largemouth on a floating wiggle minnow and rubber-legged woolly buggers. Caught a lot of green sunfish, smallies and largemouth on the finesse worm. Nothing big this trip but had a blast with the dog and my new boat. We floated from Green's Ford down to Howards Ford by Cedar Camp. It is only about two miles but had to paddle back upstream to the truck with the dog in the boat.

What kind of condition do you think the river would be in this weekend. I need a one day trip, but we got a lot of rain in KC and I don't know how much rain they got down there.

How are the water conditions on the Elk. I know some other rivers have been blown out and I am looking for a place to fish this weekend.

I have had good luck during periods of shad coming through with white woolly buggers stripped and dead drifted. I would be interested also in how others fish it.

Can you show the fly you were using and what size?

My friends and I want to do our annual trip from Kansas City sometime around the end of January. Do you fore see wading conditions improving by then if you don't get any major rain events.

Fished the Little Niangua Saturday. Me and a buddy put in at Howards Ford and floated down to Burnt Mill Spring. I tried flyfishing and had some good early morning action on the wiggle minnnow. My buddy was doing good on Yum Dingers, and then started killing them on a finesse worm on a jig head. I broke down and started throwing finesse worms on a spinning rod also. We caught more largemouth than smallies, and the green sunfish were a pain keeping off the worms, but I guess they are entertainment in-between bass. We each caught a couple of 2 1/2 pound largemouth but the biggest smallies were only about 12 inches. We caught about 20 bass each, with about as many sunfish. It was my buddies first time kayaking and river fishing. He has a great big bass boat and has only fished lakes. He had fun but did not like paddling two miles up river back to the truck. We came across a small pool that got cut off from the river. We notice some small bass chasing minnows, and we ended up catching about 10 out of the pool and walking them over to the river to throw them back in. They would have been goners in another week or two.