Quillback

Thought this looked interesting for deep fishing. Combines the glide of an ice jig with a plastic of your choice. Made by Berkley.

That is pretty neat!

This just showed up in my email, well it is an excerpt. A story of a pro and a hat! What a coincidence! Unless you've been living under a rock for the last year or so you certainly noticed the run that Bass Pro Tour professional Michael Neal has been on. What you may not have realized was Neal's specific choice in hat. During his epic 2021 season Neal wore the exact same AFTCO Watrbrorn Trucker hat, winning a Tackle Warehouse Pro Circuit AOY and claiming a BPT title in the process. At the start of the 2022 season Neal considered switching out the weathered, battle proven AFTCO hat for a fresh new model. Upon further consideration Michael chose to stick with old faithful for the first event at Sam Rayburn, and see how it went. Neal went on to win the first TWPC event of the season wearing his lucky hat. At present time Neal has won a cool $434,998 wearing the exact same hat. Needless to say the hat will not be retired anytime soon!

This is the hat a real pro wears:

Yep, Rick may be the Vernon of snowstorms. Time for him to ease up on us a bit! Got some college hoops recorded to watch and of course there is fishing tackle to mess with. Thanksfully power has remained on. So far..

Looks like Siberia out my window right now. 14 degrees, windy and still snowing. 8" on the ground.

I have never seen or heard a turkey in Bella Vista in the 16 years I have lived here.

Phttttt..that light fluffy stuff, I just go out and give it a mean look and it is gone. Still no snow here, but according to the experts it will snow tonight.

Couple of areas on Table Rock and Beaver seem to always hold a few. Other than that, doesn't seem to be many around in this part of the Ozarks.

If I had a snowblower I'd be rooting for snow too. I would probably do a couple of the neighbors driveways just for fun.

About the same here, no ice on the roads, but my truck has a pretty good glaze on it.

This year marks the 50th anniversary of the Buffalo being designated a National River/Park. There are events being planned. I have mixed feelings about this as in I don't see added publicity as a good thing, but maybe some of the events will be worth seeing. I'm something of a coffee cup collector, so I might just get a 50th cup. Buffalo National River 50th Anniversary and Celebrations! — Buffalo National River Partners (bnrpartners.org)

Surprises me that you were the only banker. A buddy of mine went with his son a few years ago and he says there were quite a few people on the bank. Looks like it was fun!

If I knew him, I'd say to him: "C'mon dude, you're supposed to FORECAST".

Mr. McBasser, you did a lot better than I did yesterday. I just could not find them, caught a half-dozen spots and a short walter. Ned rig, and the 2.8 Keitech. 22 degrees when I got to the ramp at 0745, sat in the truck for a while waiting for it to warm up a bit. When I came through Roaring River, saw a low of 19. Hit 65 on the drive home in the afternoon. Saw WT from 41 early to 43 when I left.

Forecasts are all over the place. Local news guy last night refused to give a total precipitation forecast.

Arkansas is setting up a line of flamethrower tanks along the border facing north. Resulting heat barrier will keep that cold air up in MO where it belongs. However, if that measure fails, there is no plan B.

Reid looks like he needs some time off to lose some weight. He's really moving slowly on the sideline, looks like he is in pain.

I have caught a couple of carp on jerk baits in the winter, they grab it when it is paused. I have to think they see an easy meal and go for it.

You Chief fans have my sympathy. Can't believe they lost that game.

I remember when they started the pikeminnow program, good way to make money for an unemployed fisherman, but at $3 each you have to catch a lot of them and though relatively plentiful, it's hard to catch enough to make it worthwhile.

Don't believe I have ever seen a chiselmouth despite fishing in the area where they live. In fact, never heard of them until reading that article.

Launched somewhere around 0800-0830, and fished until 1:30 PM. It was really slow to begin, the first 4 hours I fished I had one keeper sized smallie and one missed bite. Bumped into a few in the last 45 minutes and boated another keeper smallie and a couple of doinkers. All came on a Ned rig. I did try the Rock Crawler, jerk bait, and Keitech, but no bites on that stuff. The fish I caught were anywhere from 10-20 feet down dragging the Ned on the bottom. Ran into forum member Mark on the lake, he was having a tough day as far as catching, and as I was leaving, he was bringing in reinforcements - one of his buddies showed up at the ramp to jump in his boat and fish with him. Hopefully they got into them. WT was 46-48 (warmer than I thought it would be). Drug up some green stuff that I believe is hydrilla. It is not thick anywhere, but it seems to be spreading. The two keepers:

Caught yesterday by Dennis Shorb, the same person that picked up the nails and assorted hardware off the H ramp. Maybe a reward for a good deed? 27", 9.3 lbs. Mid lake deep water fish. It has obviously eaten its share of shad.

Must have somehow missed his name when I looked at the results, or maybe the weigh in wasn't finished. So I now know 2 names.