Bill Babler

It's on Baby!!! Not hardly a month goes by that someone on this board is wondering about BIG GILLS. I want to tell you now, they are here and they are BIG and MEAN. Most all the gravel points from Big M to the dam are just covered with them. I'm embarrassed to say that I should have taken a screen shot of them the last few days and it just did not register. I'm on trout for the next week, so I will try and explain what they look like. I have commissioned Bill Beck to take me a screen shot tomorrow and if he remembers, I'll post it. Look in the 15' to 25' range. They are mostly suspended 5' off the bottom, but move up and down continually with their track looking like a capital WWWWW something like that. They are fast movers and darters. Their track is very narrow kind of like a fine line vs a magic marker being bass or walleye. We had some of the largest ones I have ever seen yesterday, they look like the Hybreds you see in ponds. Talked to several guides and they were complaining something fierce about them. Hey, they will pull light crappie tackle like they want to bust it and they are more than eager to do it. Best bait is a cricket on a drop-shot rig. Use light tackle and hang on. I am also hearing of some very nice cat fishing in the flooded pockets. Keep those dinner plate size gills for supper and slap the small guys, "If you catch any" on a cat fish catcher and you will do yourself proud right now on the Rock. Get out there and get em. Good Luck

Matt, please give your friend with my recommendation; Big Ed's Guide Service. 573-692-6710 Ed has been featured in the Kansas City Star and does a weekly radio show in the area. He is very good from the Glaze to the dam, including the Gravois. I believe he lives at the 5 mile mark. Ed is a bass fishing guide. Ed and his Lovely wife Debby, are the owners of not only the Guide Service, but they also own Bass and Baskets Bed and Breakfast right on the Lake. 573-692-6737 We have known the Franko's for over 10 years and Big Ed is not only a hoot but a great fishermen. They have a beautifully appointed B&B that sits right on the water, so If you pal stays with them not only will the fishing be great, but chow is on the house. Ed has recently been added to the Phoenix/Mercury Pro Team and within a few weeks will be handling the big waters of Lake O with a 2016 Phoenix 921 ProXP Powered by a Mercury 250 ProXS with industry leading Lowrance Gen III electronics. Ed's guide service features top of the line equipment in Falcon and Lews. Good Luck

As has been mentioned Youtube is just full of the how and why to skin gar. mostly they take a small hatchet or a pair of snips to open up the back and ferret out the white loin meat and then there a zillion ways to prepare it. Most involve boiling and then forming a ball or croquet and frying. Sounds like a lot of work. As 5bites says, I get more reaction on them from a fin as just about anything. Phil and I did one year catch them pretty good on a fly rod and white jig. Never got a one in the boat. As far as everyone knowing the difference between Gizzard Shad and Gar working the surface vs bass. 99% of the clients I fish and some of these are 3 to 5 day a week fishermen, have absolute no idea. They all just assume they are bass. I've had experienced fishermen tell me surfacing carp are smalljaws so I am a bit skeptical on the knowledge of just about everyone. I have fished this lake from one end to the other in the last 30 days and seen 2 bass on the surface. If your seeing them you are way luckier than I have been. Today was really tougher. We had 11 bass all K's and 11 bluegill. The gills were huge and they are extremely thick in that 15' to 25' range. You got crickets you got gills right now Good Luck

Kind of a funny story today. We were fishing a roll-off early up the white and along comes a power pole boat. The point right next to us was covered with surfacing gar and Gizzards. I mean it was alive. The guy slams on the brakes and he and his buddy jump on the bow and start throwing a spook. I can hear them as plain as day and they are saying this is the most bass they have ever seen surfacing in their life. They worked the spooks for about 10 minutes and then the middle box lid came open and the switching was on. They were running thru topwater after topwater and you could just hear the frustration mounting, wondering why these bass just would not hit. They were still working them hard when we vacated. I should have told them maybe a piece of nylon ski rope would have worked a bit better. Regardless, they were having a blast and I just could not spoil their fun. And on top of that, You just never know. Good Luck

There were huge balls of bait today as deep as 65' Mostly in the guts between the flats. The bait was not so much suspended, but completely thru the water column. Lots and lots of it today 22' to 45'.

He has been at it a while. The process of elimination is how you find these locations, spending hours and hours on the water in specific areas.

Its weird that I did not catch a Spotted bass but not weird where I was fishing. We are now getting a pretty hard thermocline for the second time. It's always a good thing this time of the year to fish near it. Our 3 biggest fish today were LM all at that 3 pound mark and all of them came in the 26 to 35 ft. depth range.

Surface temps at Viney this morn were 89.5 degree at the back ramp at 5:45 Jim Fritz and I started out on flat gravel where I have been really wacking them, up until about the middle of last week. Today was one of the strangest days I have ever had on the Rock. 22 total fish today with not a single Kentucky. Nada K's. Zero Spotted bass. Not a single one. Cannot remember a day when my boat did not have a K. We had 16 smallmouth and 6 largemouth, with 8 really solid keepers. Within an hour we were the junk fishing masters, as I could not put the slightest of a pattern together. Caught the fish from 5' to 35' on a Fishhead Spin, 1/2 oz. jig, 3/4 oz. jig, drop shot, Carolina rig and a flutter spoon. Man did I have it figured out. NOT!!! Gosh I hate to scramble like that. Good thing was we were catching enough to keep us occupodotoed. Fished 13 locations and caught as least 1 off 12 of them. Had 3 for a high off one location. Had to move and move. Not very often I don't catch Mister K with 22 fish coming on board, but today was that day. Good Luck

The entire lake right now is just teeming with Gizzard Shad. Probably one of the largest hatches and total amount that I have ever seen. There are also huge schools of threadfin immediately under the Gizzards. You will see the Gizzards porpoise with their backs and sometimes entire body coming out of the water. These are not feeds, they are just schools of bait fish. They have been driving my clients wild, thinking they were bass chasing. As they come out of the water most uninformed folks think they are being pushed, but they are just swimming in schools at the surface, causing a disturbance. Good Luck

That is just about as Super as it gets. Enjoy those boys, they will be 30 yrs. old tomorrow. That's how fast the time will fly. That is one really nice looking pond. Fill the feeders and put out the mineral, bow season is just around the corner.

Lets, let this forum get back to its usual business of helping and reporting fishing conditions. Take the BS elsewhere. Man comes on and makes a great post with super screen shots and you get a completely controversial ignorant post to follow it. No room or need for that here. Contribute something positive or just stay off the forum. We don't want or need pot stirrers.

Run on right and bow down on right, going down just like driving a car, you drive on the right. As I mentioned to my knowledge on the collisions. Now we have one incident in 1/2 million hrs. Still a pretty good average.

Rules of the Road dictate you drive up stream on the right and when you go down stream bow first you stay on the right. If your drifting on the White River with full visibility and very little traffic drift where you wish. As mentioned when you are on Upper Taney right now if you will follow the simple Rules of the Road there will be no problem. A little something more about this. In the last 20 yrs. with a lot of this time driving in foggy conditions, there have been ZERO guide boats that have been involved in any type of an on water collision to my knowledge. That is 1/2 MILLION HOURS, of operation without a single accident. 1/2 MILLION HOURS. It could happen tomorrow. It could happen to me. But we have a record that is beyond reproach to this point, with 1000's of hours driving under the same conditions that were there yesterday. The guides drive and keep on the right. They can see. Fishing and catching fish means SQUAT for any of them that I personally know when it comes to your safety and the safety of their clients is by far our number 1 and really only concern. I personally will take this thread to heart and reinforce my complete concentration on my boat handling and operation. However if the visibility is such that I can safely see and navigate, I will proceed with caution. Good Fishing.

Guys, I was out there yesterday, and as a former State Water Patrol Officer, I noticed lots of problems 99% was not that of the guides. Most of the guides using the modified Bay Boats have absolutely no vision problems, especially in that type of loose fog that was out there yesterday. Take the bank test. Look how far from your boat you can see up the bank line and it is pretty easy to judge distance. We are out there everyday, and we can see and are used to looking in the fog, especially like yesterday when there was 200 plus feet of visibility on a very loose fog. The guides and the people in the glass boats do and will have a problem operating in heavy current at slow speed and keeping the bow of the boat down. Also there are a couple of them that throw huge wakes and with the fish and all the people jammed in a small area it seemed like overkill. It was not a problem. The problem is people operating boats in the wrong lane of traffic and floating in the wrong lane of traffic and expecting everyone to come to a quick halt and just let them do what they wish. Not going to happen for the most part. With the current running you go up stream on the RIGHT AND DOWN STREAM ON THE RIGHT. PERIOD. I never saw a single guide and I was out there all morning that was not hugging the EXTREME right bank going up and drifting the EXTREME right bank going down. Never in the middle, one side or the other. On the other hand rental boats, pleasure boats, and just folks out having fun not to mention the canoes and kayaks were all over the place. Lets just drive on the wrong side of the road all the time was the theme yesterday. I personally asked at least 5 different boaters why they were driving up the wrong side of the lake or drifting powerless right down the middle. Every answer was the same. It does not matter what side of the lake you drive on. WRONG. Keep right and leave the center lane open and there would have been no problem. I am a safety freek, there are times I make my clients wait or even cancel. Yesterday was not one of them. If that amount of visibility impairs your vision, or you are apprehensive then you should indeed wait for a better condition. The only comments my clients made were boaters driving up the wrong side of the lake. Even with this it was not a problem as visibility was more than safe. As far as dodging the lake is narrow up there and the current was running 4 miles per hour. If your driving up the correct right side of the lake, why would anyone have to dodge you? And as I said earlier I you were drifting down the wrong side yesterday you were not using your head. Stay Right. Not taking up for anyone and someone might have thought I was one of the problems, but I only saw a couple of glass guide boats that may have been and really even though they were throwing huge waves, they were running in the correct boating lanes and drifting correctly. Just some ramblings.

Back Ramp at Viney is very steep and extremely dangerous. Parking is limited. Best not use it

Plug you pretty much nailed it. It is now-a-days, all about me. The rest of you including my wife can take a flying leap at a rolling tire. I don't care how long it takes me or how long you have to wait, I got here first and I'll do what I please. This ramp launches 3 boats at a time, and he had the entire 3 lanes blocked. Would have taken him but a few minutes of his time to pull completely out and perhaps watch a little bit. If he would have asked anyone in a polite manner, including his wife for help, as you all know if any of you know me, I would have been the first one to assist. This was not the case. Know it all and belligerent was. Denny that pretty much would not work for either you or I. That pretty much covers it, lets go fishing.

As you all remember from last week, I did offer assistance there, but this situation regardless of the price of the rig was totally out of hand. Human Safety was at issue last week, not today, only foul tempers. You could tell this guy usually got his way and was going to own the ramp regardless. I heard his wife ask him 3 times to let others launch. He told her to "Be Quiet. and do what I tell you." That is when the Champion guy starting making noise, and he was far from the only one. I had sneaked out on the edge of the ramp using one tire on concrete and one on gravel. I was out of the way, but would not recommend that for others. As been stated I do it everyday. Another point has been made here. I would not have jumped in that truck nor that boat to try and launch it. Just flat to valuable, one mistake and I'm in big trouble, and to tell you the truth, I know nothing about that type of rig, I would have been as green as he was with an outfit that size. I had no problem jumping in a 5 year old F150 and backing it in last week to pull out a 10 year old boat that the owner was swearing I was going to tear up by doing it the way I was. Figured I could pay for that if I screwed it up. Could not have paid for gas for the rig yesterday. Did not see any shooting deaths in the area yesterday, so I guess it sorted its self out. Good Luck

I shot low on his tow vehicle, priced the Caddy he was driving and I believe it was right at $110.000.00. he could have spent a bit more or a scouch less. Regardless, he was in a bit of a different tax bracket than me.

Master Craft XStar you can look it up. Starting price is $158,000.00 plus options. 24.11 ft. You can get into the boat for well over 2 hundred big ones and this one looked like it had it all. I guessed 150 but I'm probably off at least 50 GRRRR. on the short side. He was launching it will a full size Escalade, and the cheap ones start at 83 grand. I'm guessing the guy was maybe 35 and his bride was under that.

Guess I'm just lucky to keep running into crap on the ramps. This time on the Rock and I'm not saying where. A young couple with 3 kids were trying to launch a Battleship of a wake boat today and just having an impossible time attempting it. With the high water, these ramps are flat and just about as unforgiving as the fish were for me today. Mom was in the boat and Dad was trying to back it down. Trying being the key word here. He was taking all 3 slots on a 3 lane ramp with 8 boats waiting to either put in or take out. This was so bad that for a while I did not know whether he was trying to launch the boat or the "truck." He had both headed nose down the ramp at some points. After about 10 minutes of this BS a guy in a Big White Champion, lit into them with about as many 4 letter words as I think Funk and Wagnals has in its senior edition. About the 3rd time I heard the word Bitch I got out of there. There was really no way to help this couple, they had no business with a $150,000.00 rig in that position. Absolute No Business. I could see steam rising from everyone, especially when they backed into the water and finally made it only to discover they had not unhooked the rear tie downs, and had to pull it sideways back out. I blame some of this on the boat dealers, It should be mandantory for them to show people how to load and unload the boat. The young folks should also know that they do not own the ramp and there is a time limit on bunking and debunking, especially with the amount of usage at this time of the year. Like Quill, today I had plenty of traffic. Did not fuss abit when a guy trolled between me and the bank and caught a short K and promptly threw it in the live well without measuring it. Did not say a word when 2 wake boats bracketed me, one between me and the bank and the other about 1/2 cast behind me. Both putting wakes over the bow and stern. Share the water, that my new motto. Gosh I miss Sac River Jim

You might call Chri Tetrick Mid Lakes guide service, he is using a lot of lead and may be interested.

Jerry, I'm with you on those spybaits, probably about the biggest waste of money I have ever done in fishing gear. If they will hit that spinbait they will hit a hundred other baits in your box that you already have that you are not using.

Last post on the topic as it has gotten out of hand. At this time of the year, after the spawn you will see if you are lucky enough to find them large concentrations of fish that have schooled to feed after the rigors of spawning. Entire lake sections of fish can be on one location. From the mouth of the James to point 12, From the dam to Kimberling City and up the White from Baxter to Cedar Creek They are at their most vulnerable at this time as they have congregated in huge numbers. One of our biologist told me that this is the time that the population can be overharvest the worst. The second worst time is in the Winter when they follow the shad schools into the creeks, and also congregate in huge lake section numbers, before they disperse to spawn in the Spring. If you are so lucky to find a location holding a huge school of mostly spotted bass, it is a lake section full. Try other similar location that are near and most often they will be completely devoid of fish. ( THIS IS NOT A PATTERN, THIS IS A LOCATION.) I hope you understand what I am saying here. It can seeM that the lake is absolute full of fish but try and catch them like this within a mile of two of your hot spot, and most times you will come up either completely empty or just a fish here or there. A big concentration of fish on a single location does not tell you the health of the lake. Case in point, my last week guide trip. We fished for over 2 hrs. without a bite on deep trees and long river channel ridges with but a pittance to show. I landed on a runnout at the mouth of the James and my screen completely lite up. We had fished at least 10 similar locations. We caught and released over 20 nice bass in the next couple of hours off the single location. They are not everywhere folks and when you find them they at this time of the year can be there in quanity. I really have no problem with folks catching fish by any legal means, including crawlers, shiners, or crayfish. Great way to get the young ones started and the older folks that have trouble casting a fun day on the pond, and really does not hurt the fish any worse than sticking a spook in them. Really not quite as bad. I have had clients catch latterly thousands of fish on live bait in my years as a guide and I will tell you, I have seen far less damage to the fish with a single size 1 hook in the upper lip of a crawler hooked fish than I have on a jerkbait or a crank. The one problem is fish care. Most of these deep fish must be immediately returned to the water as their swim bladders will expand if they are kept out of the H2O for over a 1/2 minute. Never put them in a live well or they will expand. Tournament fishermen can fizz them but most of us need a quick pic and let them live to bite again, with a quick release. One more quick point is weighing in bedding fish in tournaments. Again our lake biologist point out this is not a significant problem for spawning fish. Fish do not have a home other than the water. If you remove either a male or female from a bed and relocate that fish, it means simply nothing to that fish. Fish are not monogamous, they simply go to a different spawning location and continue the process. They don't pine away for their lost mate or try and swim back to the original bed location, they just do it again where they are. Also my friend pointed out on Table Rock only a very small percentage of bedding fish can be clearly seen or targeted due to the spawning depth that fish have in this lake, clear out to 20' in certain situations. Major problem here is water fluctuation during the spawn and unstable weather conditions. A few years ago, I guess its been 20 now, a friend of mine and a couple of buddies up on Lake O targeted quit a few bedding fish in the dam area. I believe they took about 20 with a combination of males and females as they were on the beds. Took them to one of the clear spring fed farm ponds one of them owned that had recently been cleaned out and needed repopulated. With in several days, in the clear water there were bass on beds, so the transportation, did not meant squat to those fish. Not condoning or promoting, but bass tournaments don't have that huge of effect on the spawn. Most times there are but only a small number of participants that actually bed fish like this. Good luck out there

I have never seen this picture or the logo, where can I see it and it will be removed immediately. Did not even know it existed. I thought it was of me holding two Smallies for Denver Dixon to photograph that were immediately released at Big M. boat dock

Boating and loading boats is a completely different situation. While someone can be a reasonable boater, putting a boat on a trailer in a 3.5 mile an hour current is quite another. The main problem as Fin pointed out is putting the durn trailer in to deep, which was the case again today. The reason for all the guys in the water was to try and hold the boat on the trailer against the current. Was not going to happen, no matter what they did. To do it in Taneycomo in 46 degree water was insane. To show how easy these boats go on a trailer, I can put my 22' Phoenix on the trailer with just the bunks wet, and completely out of the water the full length. As long as the bunks are wet and I have clearance for the prop, it will slide on as smooth as a baby's bottom. As far as posting reports, the Aunts Creek thread made me so sick, that until that piece of garbage goes completely away I will probably keep pretty much to myself. This Forum being the Table Rock Lake Forum has been from the start a pretty much green catch and release forum, probably 95%. Know one is interested in seeing dead fish with bellies full of spawn, I know I'm not. I had countless emails and messages, and my answer is if that's is whats wanted on here and all the bashing and bickering, I'll just stay off with my reports, until that goes away. It is still here and I'm not posting on fishing.