Bill Babler

Saturday nite Flat Creek smoked Prime Rib. Best in South Mo

Travis, That area has produced some of the largest fish in the entire lake. As you can see it’s right by the slews and just by the Artisian water that comes into that pocket across from Cooper out of the college Main lake there is called the DerrickHole as there is a series of gravel riffles. Back in the day the gravel Gerdy mined that area and it is most always a good location Good Luck

Had to post this picture from yesterday. Lynn caught this 20 1/4 inch brown, that was simply a beautiful fish. This fish had a huge RAT in its stomach. The tail was sticking out of his throat and it was not a mouse but a big rat Fish was caught and released just down from Cooper Creek on the college side on a pink Berkley power worm.

Great job Alex I could not for the life of me get bit on that flat water Sunday

The speed and depth of Baylor compared to the Zags was totally out of proportion. Baylor's third big had 11 rebounds at only 6'5". He did weigh 260 however and could run and jump like a deer Baylor's first 3 off the bench start for everybody in the country. Total mismatch. Even though the Zags had some good P5 wins if they played a Big 10-12, SEC,ACC Pac 10 schedule they would have multiple losses.

Nice fish and a wonderful tip. Thanks.

In speaking with the guide circuit, there is almost no bite in the morning. Even Saturday we struggled to noon. My bite yesterday was 3 pm or so till almost dark. Every fish we caught Saturday and all the fish yesterday were on the down stream side of windy points. Kind of in the Ebb or Lee of the points. It's hard to discribe and this is probably to much information, but where the wind was running in on the points, no bites, you had to kind of fish the slack if you know what I mean. Wind was the most important but the fish were most all positioned in the same area on every point. Hard to explain. Also I never had a single bite on a jerk bait. All came on the SB, boat in 30' to 40'.

With the wind blowing in and the sun shining on Saturday, we pretty much hammered the staging fish. Sunday a totally different day, as dead flat calm beat our Dobbers down. We had 2 keeps and 2 shorts in 5 hrs. and I don't think we missed a bite. I guided trout Monday morning and had my best day of the year. Water has stabilized down there and the trout are back to being trout, they were starving. Got home at noon and the wind was blowing a gale out of the South. I headed for 86 ramp. Surface temp in Long Creek at 60 degree water extremely stained. Fished for 2 hours without a bite on wind and had a dose. Really all the structure is out of the water with the lake at this level and you for sure can't crank or put anything on the bottom or it comes back slimed. Really hard fishing right now from the dam up LC. Went around the corner past the dam to a totally different world. Water on the main White is totally gin clear. Simply beautiful, it is so amazing seeing the fish 20' down fighting. Just look at how beautiful that Indian Point water is. How blessed are we. Surface temps 56 degree, fish staging on every point as shallow as 10' and as deep as 30'. Just what you like to see. The Live Scope. Lit up like it had measles. I had seen all but nothing in the stained water. Fished for 2 more hours swimming the small swim bait and it was pretty relentless action. Did not hit a single location without multiple catches. Again breath taking gin clear Table Rock Lake. LM like clear water too. Best of the day was this 4.10 LM right on a windy point where she belonged this time of year. Don't let the warm stained water fool you, they like clear cool water too. Good Luck.

Really tough on us yesterday morning but the afternoon was just about as good as it could be. Wind started blowing in on the long points and the thumper K's really got wound up. There for a while it was every single cast on the Keitech 2.8 Fished from Cow to Mill Creek. Tried the floater early but no love. Fish were really tight to the bottom. Boat in 32 to 35 feet. Most all fish were caught dead slow swimming the bait as near the bottom as we could keep it in the 20' plus range. Steve and I went and picked up Becky and she also got in on the action. She refused having her picture taken, so I'm holding one of her bass.

Yep I think the bottom jig caught some moss but the upper shad fly stayed clean. Good point.

Duane said he and his client had a fantastic day today with over 50 fish to the boat in the Restricted zone. We made 3 passes and caught 3 per pass on a 1/16 oz maribou on the bottom and a size 10 Shad fly on the top. Shad fly was suspended at 6’ under the indicator and the weighted jig at 8’. Had fish follow it to the boat multiple times on the recast. Shad fly caught 8 of the 9 fish. Moved down past Lilleys and caught them great on a crawler for the first time it seems like in several months. Not stockers these were some dandy bows. Things are for sure improving

I’m giving the Hogs more credit. Those dudes are resilient. I’m not a huge Jaylan Williams fan, I think he slows them down and hurts them. Pigs been winning with a small lineup and I bet Musselman keeps that up Going to be a good game or a Baylor blowout Be fun to watch

kU is in a serious pickle, that is going to be hard to get out of. Their only revenue sport has 5 level 1 and half dozen level 2 violations hanging on it. Tupee billie is going to get a show-cause and a lack of institutional control. The football program if you can call it that is a total embarrassment Got a feeling things are going to change in the sunflower state sooner rather than later. The face of Big 12 Basketball is changing, as nothing lasts forever. Doesn't matter to me one way or the other we have our hands full in the SEC as Vernon pointed out.

With Pitman only making 3 million a year Arkansas is going to have to make a decision, are they a basketball school or a football school. You don't pay your BB coach more than your football coach in the SEC, you just don't. That really cost Missouri when GP was our football coach, just not going to go get a BB coach and pay him more. Arkansas is going to have to revisit SP's contract and bring him up to at least 4.5 to get Mussleman to that 3.5 or 4 range. Bottom line is he is going to get offered more elsewhere if he wants to go. Beard is making 5 mil at TT and word on the street is Texas might be willing to bump that up to the same as their new football coach, so there is money out there if Eric wants it. And yes, Arkansas will be a huge problem for Mizzou, always have been.

Just got a call from Stone. Said shad are just pouring thru this morning.

They may not have as many derby's as we do but I think they have more boats in each event. I think they mentioned that Friday there was a 400 boat deal also going on. I know on Fork this last year KVD was totally beside himself and he is just about as low key as it gets to distractions. He wasn't having a melt down but was about 1 more boat away from having one. I used to go to Fork a lot but it simply got to crowded and the guys I went with quit going for that reason. Lots of traffic here but TR fishes big most of the time.

Doug they mentioned several times and it has been brought up here. I have never fished it but the MLF Crew kept saying Rayburn fishes small. What did they mean by this, and have you fished it? Bobby Lane said at least 2 times that he was covered up with other fishermen. When they would show the pros there was most often other boats in view and they were not watching, they were fishing. I know Mark Davis was simply surrounded Thanks, ill listen off the line.

Yep, you beat me to it. Motor restrictions. As far as Taney, Phil is right don't know a guide that has not saved at least one capsized kayak. My worst one was a Mature guy and his wife going under Trout Hollow dock a few years ago. Have no idea how they lived thru it. Good Lord was sitting on their shoulder. Saved another over weight gal overturned by a boat wake in the logs across from Trout Hollow and got her up on the bank. That was a bad one too. Lots of high volume water and narrow in that location. Pretty dangerous for the Yackers. Total bane to navigation.

As Phil said, just no good way to get that photo without some danger to the fish. For the most part the clients we take are on their one and only fishing trip of the year and know nothing except what we try and help them with. Lots of Spring break kids this time of year. Most not wanting to kill fish, but all wanting that photo for their $300 plus dollar 4 HR trips. None understanding the fragility or really the protection of the fish. To most it is an unlimited resource, especially if they have fished the salt or Texoma in the past. They just don't understand what the fuss is about. I hate the boga as it can split the lower jaw in certain cases. I've been lucky and of the 10's of thousands of trout my clients have caught I have never seen a split lip trout on Taney. Unlike Alaska as I have seen many there. I don't post a lot of trout pic's as for the most part, I'm in them as I pretty much insist, that I hold the fish for the client to assure that it doesn't hit the bottom of the boat. Lets be thankful the majority of these folks throw those 20 inchers back with just a quick photo and not be to hard on them for their excitement about the photo to remember them by.

One winter a few years back I tried to look up the entire US. Spent several days on it and Lake O was number 1 and Table Rock number 2 in the country. That's not counting those chain lakes in Florida, Georgia and Alabama or the California Delta. Texas was up there, with Fork, but TB and Rayburn were back a bit. As far as throwing in recreational anglers I would not have a clue how to even figure that out but I'd put money on Texas.

Just looked up the Rock for 2021 and it looks like 563 sanctioned tournaments with close to 11,000 boats so far. I'm sure there will be more Lake O. 515 tournaments. Did not count boats, but the Rock blew both Rayburn and Lake O. away. Those were 2020 year stats for Sam Rayburn however but no way they are going to add an additional 200 derbys in 21.

Last year I tallied up the numbers and LO had a few more total boats. I believe they stated this morning Rayburn had 324 derby’s last year and I can’t remember but think that was behind both TR and LO. Don’t know the number of boat however Lucas just lost another one. He catches his bites and he would have blown this away

Man what a great evening. Thanks for posting. Terrific pictures.

I totally agree, that was completely stupid. That rod and drag is the only thing that keeps that line from breaking. He is for the most part creating his own problems. We have all been there asking ourselves, why did we do that or just how did that happen. When your fishing with that kind of pressure, it’s easy to make mistakes.

Well that one just came off. Poor guy is snake bit. Losing 3 big bites, it’s hard to win let alone against these guys