Quillback

I launched about 0800 and headed way up War Eagle looking for whites, could not find any but caught a couple of LM's, one keeper and a couple of shorts on white Road Runners. BTW for you striper guys, there were lots of guide boats up War Eagle fishing shad under balloons. I then decided to try for LM's and zoomed to Piney creek cove, fished a Mcstick, picked up 3 whites and a couple of shorts LM's. Wind started howling so I decided to head back to the launch, decided to stop and fish a shallow cove near the Hickory creek launch, threw a spinner bait at some shallow flooded buckbrush in the back of the cove and found a pretty good bite, caught 6 or so 12 inch LM's all skinny males. In honor of my first SB bass of the year I took his picture. Did I mention there were LOTS of boats? I have never seen so many fishermen on Beaver, lots of bass boats, lots of crappie fishers, and quite a few striper boats. When I was on War Eagle I bet a boat zoomed by every 10 minutes on average, and I am not exaggerating. You could not go down a bank for more than 15 minutes without coming across another boat. All the water I fished was stained brown with maybe a foot of visibility.

What's the link to get to your store and buy them online?

Yep KTM that's the boat I had when I lived in Washingston state. A couple of times I had it out in seas I should not have been out in (I was young and dumb), but that boat got me back to the dock.

Thanks for the reports, glad to hear they are turning on!

Hey ktm3m is that Whaler of yours a Montauk? I used to have one of those when I lived in Seattle, used to take it out into Puget sound and salmon fish. Used to use it on the lakes and troll for trout also. Those boats can handle some really tough weather, as long as your outboard keeps chugging you can ride out almost anything.

That wallie was in Honey creek cove, where there was some runoff coming into the lake.

Alright! Thanks for sharing the pics!

JEB, sounds like you made the retirement decision, good for you! I plan to be there in a month myself. Sorry, still don't have a temp probe or thermometer, but I just ordered one. Water was still cold, mid to upper forties I would guess. I think by the end of this week the bass should be going strong. I'm off Friday through Tuesday, so give me a holler if you need someone to weigh down the back of your boat, or we could take mine up War Eagle and try for whites. That Woo Daves c-riggin CD you gave me was very informative, I definitely plan to do some c-rig fishing once the water warms up.

Could be NWA, it was scraped on the other side at about the same place, so maybe it had a close encounter with a big fish.

No I did not, I saw several boats heading up the way, maybe they found some.

Very nice smallie! Did you think you had one heck of a trout until you saw it was a smallie?

I installed software at the plant a couple of years ago, the guys there were telling me that the fishing was great. They were telling me they would only issue a limited amount of permits each day, but that became an issues as guys would reserve their spot in advance and when there day came up they would try and fish even if the wind was really bad which led to some boats getting in trouble. I guess niow it's a open to all, no reservations needed. I think the lake is managed as catch and release, or else they have a slot limit type deal, but I might be remembering wrong.

It was a beautiful day, attached a pic of my ride prior to launching at Lost Bridge North, blue skies and flat water! Fishing was a little slow for me, a couple of spots caugh on a Mcstick and one walleye that got off at the boat (lucky for him as he was frying pan material). Also I attached a pic of one of the spots, he looks a little sick, some brown goo on the dorsal fin, scrapes on both sides.

I'm got tomorrow off and trying to decide where to go, are the War Eagle/White arms looking OK? I am hoping the recent snow/rain hasn't muddied them up.

The only problem, according to the biologists, is that the Florida srain bass don't do well as far north as Missouri, just a little too cold for them.

We got about 8 inches in NW Arkansas, I noticed on the gauge that Beaver has come up a foot in the last few days. I'm going to try and get on the lake Friday, if I do, I'll leave a report.

I like RPS's BBQ idea, I'll be happy to show up and help out if it's a date I can make.

That looks like a Koi, those things can go for big bucks, it looks like the one of the ones shown in this (middle, top row) link, it's $200.00 for a 12 inch one. A bigun like that, who knows? The tough part would be keeping it alive and getting it to a buyer. http://www.thekoifarm.com/koiForSale.php

About the weather... Work like a dog all week, while taking note of the beautiful weather, sunny warm days. Weekend rolls around and it's cold, windy, rainy with potential snow tonight and tomorrow. This just ain't fair.

Thanks for the report, nice pics. I would love to be out there today, but the weather is not cooperating.

And the guy who said the horse is dead brought the whole topic up.

That's awesome! Good to see the little guy had a great day!

Tacklewarehouse.com has Vicious Floro on sale as a daily special, haven't used it myself, but I have heard others say it is good floro.

I have been looking at some crankin rods myself, tacklewarehouse has quite a selection and they have a search tool that you can use to see all the cranking sticks they have, they carry just about everything mentioned in the above posts and it's a good place to do some research even if you don't buy from them.

Very nice! Been lookin for one of those myself..