Quillback

Fished from first light until about 11 AM. Got a few early and after that it was tough, but I could get a bite every now and then. I got 3 small spots on top water, and another 8 bass on jigs. Fished 1/2 oz Nutech jigs around trees and the fish I caught were in 10-20 FOW. Mostly smallmouth on the jig, but got a keeper largemouth and a keeper meanmouth also. Found a stretch of bank near Lost Bridge marina that has what I believe is hydrilla growing in the water. Couldn't drag a bait on the bottom in that area without getting that stuff on my bait. I don't recall ever running across it in Beaver. Surface temp 85. This post has been promoted to an article

Some Arkansas bear history: http://arbear.org/education/the-greatest-restoration

Cool, looking forward to it. Harvey Horne, who lives here in Bella Vista, won the Central Open on the Arkansas river this spring, and I believe that qualifies him to fish in the championship. He's a good guy, hope he does well. Central Open #3 starts tomorrow on the Red river.

I need to do that soon. Love catching those nice sized gills.

Page 7 and 8. http://www.marinemastertrailers.com/pdfs/a-60_actuator_maintenance.pdf

That's the one, but you should be able to reset it so you don't have that backup issue anymore.

I have a Marine master myself. Hopefully you still have the trailer booklet, it should have instructions on how to reset the deal that causes the brakes to activate when you backup. If not, you can give Marine Master a call. If all else fails, JWM trailer in Reed Springs do great work, I have had my trailer in there a couple of times, always been satisfied and they are very reasonable. https://www.mapquest.com/us/missouri/jwm-trailer-sales-inc-357631164

I can probably count on two hands the number of gut or gill hooked fish I have had on a Ned rig, don't know how many Ned rig bass I have caught, but it's easily over a thousand. Plus the ones I've seen caught on it by people fishing with me. It just doesn't happen. I can't explain it, you'd think they would swallow that little bait down, but they don't. I use almost exclusively cut Zinkers and Dave's heads with a #2 hook. C-rigs, Texas rigs, jerk baits, crankbaits - now those are lures and methods where I have problems with them swallowing it. I don't fish the Ned rig because of the low hooking mortality, I fish it because it just flat out works sometimes better than anything else I could fish. We're all going to kill some fish just by catching them, we just should all try and minimize the mortality by doing the best we can to minimize hook damage and take care of them as best we can when we put them in a livewell.

Got up early, had plans to haul the boat either to Eagle Rock or Big M. Last night the weatherman thought the storms would likely dissipate before they worked there way this far south. Checked the radar, lots of angry red colors showing and it should hit here soon. Maybe tomorrow or later this week I'll get out.

I don't fish crankbaits enough, always fun to catch fish on them.

That guy should show up for the Jigfest food.

I sent a PM to Mojorig who is an AGFC Bio for the region that contains Bull Shoals.

Good to see you back, and I'm pulling for your wife to get back to 100% healthy as I am sure she will be before long.

Thanks for posting that, hopefully Wally World is carrying it.

Wow! Congrats to the angler!

I had one guy move up a bit today, other than that, they all fell BACKWARDS. Hackney holds the lead despite only having an 11 lb. bag.

It was a tough one, fished from dawn until about 11 AM and landed 9 bass total, mix of smallies and spots. 3 of the smallies were right around the 15" mark. Caught a 20" walleye also. Most of my bites were on jigs fished around timber back in Indian creek, fish were in about 10 FOW for the most part. Got a couple on the Carolina rig with a Zoom UV Speed craw, and that's what the walleye ate. Didn't see much striper activity or much top water activity. WT-82 Appears to be a plankton bloom going on, water was stained green. This post has been promoted to an article

My grandpa was old school on cleaning fish too. He thought too much meat was wasted on fillets so he always scaled and headed them and grandma fried them whole. Always liked to eat the tail if it's fried crispy.

Dang, Skeet is leading with 5 for 10 lbs. right now. Swindle has caught 32, but his best 5 are 8.5 lbs. (sounds like one of my days).

Appreciate the brownie relocation Bo, now if we can get Alex to bring a limit of 8 lb. largemouth to be released at Eagle Rock...

Hey if it works for you, then it's good. I'm likely the goofy one using lighter stuff. I don't mean to state that my methods are the be-all and end-all of c-rigging, it's just what works for me. I bet if you ask a 100 guys that c-rig what their rigs are, you'll get a 100 different answers.

If someone gets your SSN and creates a new ID using it, you'll care then.

I use Flouro main line, 12 lb. Abrazx, I just don't like braid, but that's just a personal preference, I have seen quite a few people that use braid as a mainline. On the mainline I'll thread a barrel weight, brass clicker and a glass bead, then tie on a barrel swivel. I use 10 lb. mono for a leader, about 3 feet. With a lighter lb. test leader than the mainline, if the hook gets hung up, hopefully the hook will break off and not they whole set up which happens if the mainline breaks.

I have suggested to Mr. Babler that he could write a book about all of his fishing experiences and the people he has met. He could get Champ to edit it.