jdmidwest

I don't know how it happens, but we are pretty religious about it.

Went out again today in a place that has been good early in the past. Found a few toad stools and some old oysters and fantails. Looks like the mushrooms are going to be lost in the foilage this year, things are really green around here already. Plum and redbud are blooming, trilliiams and mayapples are out. Ash are making seeds, all about 3 weeks early.

Went out Tuesday and did not see any. Things are looking good though,

I think it passed.

All manner of plain clothes law enforcement carry daily without the display of a badge in plain sight, nobody calls the law on them. I really don't think open carry makes you a target or draws any questions. Most CCW I know tend to stick to mini 380's which I really don't consider much of a self defense weapon, even with the best of ammo. I would rather open carry a full size handgun and feel like it would get the job done instead of an underpowered one hiding on my person. Open carry gives you better access to your weapon also. On the other hand, I tend to be discrete when carrying guns in and out of the house. And I really don't make a point to let others know that I have anything other than the one I carry. I don't wish to be the target of a thief when I am away.

Chuck Tryon's Trout book had information on insects and hatches. I think there are drawings also. I think someone else did one, but can't remember who. Probably MDC website would be a good place for online info.

I have always seen them float point down with the bead slightly higher than the shank of the hook. The tippet and current seems to make them do that. Maybe in still water it would be the other way around. I usually put a few wraps of lead wire on the hook and tuck it under the larger side of the bead and hold it in place. Straight eye or down bend, the hook point rides down.

This thread is going like Kurt Cobain at a gun shop......

Could be possible. MO has a nice population of them now. http://mdc.mo.gov/discover-nature/wildlife-sightings/bears

Looks like the Spring River Died on Feb. 9.

I would go with an ultralight and a rooster tail with gold blades and yellow, white, or black tail. Or tube jigs.

Al, lets try South Fork of the Spring River this summer. I have never really floated thru, just put in near Salem and paddled up and down.

Phil is out of town and the internet cops are not looking. This political season has been a bigger joke than the last one.

I saw them chop the feet of some poor bait slinger wearing a pair of wally world felts. Of course, he was limping off of the handicap bridge after he slipped on the slime and busted his wrists and a nice Zebco rod. It was like some Islamic nightmare.

But this thread should have focused on the POACHERS that are gigging illegal fish, not all giggers in general. Giggers gigging suckers are not harming any resource. Gigging is limited to rough fish that are not usually targets to sport fishermen. Gigging in the olden days included sport fish, then it became regulated to protect the game fish. Gigging has been around long before the advent of the halogen bulb and jet motor. Many old jon boats with a pine log fire in the middle and no motor floated along with a couple of giggers. With the advent of the carbide light, gigging improved somewhat. Then it evolved into what it is today.

I don't know of any places that carry ladybugs locally. We usually have enough of them around here naturally. They usually wad up for the winter in my storage shed.

Looks like Phil forgot to turn on the cussing blocker when he switched the forum over this time. I miss the spell checker too. For the record, I don't gig or plan to. I don't know anyone that does. But you can not slam a sport just because you are seeing POACHERS using the sport to collect illegal game. Report it to the MDC or do the leg work and prove it with pics of someone gigging the bass yourself.

But when someone makes a statement that states, "Gigging Sucks", you essentially condemn all giggers, the legal ones and the POACHERS. No method of taking game is really more effective in the hands of an experienced individual. Gigging is not a method of mass destruction. A POACHER that is using his method to take game is doing so illegally, no matter what the method. As I have stated in the past, Don't condemn a sporting method just because some POACHERS are abusing it. Target the poachers and eliminate them.

Just because you don't understand a sport, you really should not condemn it. As a catch and release smallie hunter, how many smallmouth do you kill a year in your pursuits? You catch one and stress it, you foul hook it and it contracts a disease, you fatally gill hook it and it dies instantly, you hold one out of the water too long while you get the camera out to take a picture. You are probably are not really fully aware of the mortality of the smallmouth bass species that involves your sport either. And what about the legal bait fishers wanting to take a creel of bass and having to release ones that do not meet the size requirements, but have a hook and a minnow buried deep in their gullets? Giggers pursue a non-game species of suckers that do not readily take a bait on the hook and line. Sometimes they hit a smallie by mistake. Sometimes you catch a Longear Sunfish when you are targeting Smallies. And, like any outdoor sport, there are those worthless SOB's that poach. It happens with all game pursuits, there are the unworthy around us that POACH. Flyfishers poach and keep more fish than the limit allows. Hunters kill more than the limit. Every species has its POACHERS. That does not mean you should eliminate a method or a pursuit of a species of game in this state.

We took a hit over here too last night. One started in Marquand, MO, went skipping thru Oak Ridge, MO, crossed the river and may have been the one that finally landed as an EF4 in Harrisburg, IL. I can see the storm path across the field from my house and heard the roar from it as it passed thru here about 2 tenths of a mile away. I did not have any damage, but neighbors on other side of street had roof damage, carports moved, and a trampoline carried for several hundred feet. Trees were not pushed over or damaged for the most part but pole barns and houses seemed to take the most of the damages. Barns and sheds scattered, several houses damaged, debris scatter everywhere. Several injuries here. Harrisburg IL looks kinda like Joplin did last year, deaths, destruction, injuries. Other storms hit around Puxico near Duck Creek and I think one person died in that one. Another storm is supposed to roll thru Friday. I hope this is not the start of another round like we had last Easter.

From the little info I have gleaned from past experience and current research, bees have been bred for many years by bee keepers to try and get preferred characteristics. Of course you want gentle and good pollinators. Nobody wants to mess with an angry beehive when it comes time to move them or collect honey. A quick search shows the mason as a certain species of bee that makes a mud nest and is not really for honey or hives. It is not a colony bee, it is a solitary bee. But it does pollinate. So does the bumble bee, which may be the same thing, but it bores holes in wood and makes a mess. You do not have to buy a hive or mess with them, from the looks of it, you just let them go wild. Kinda like the ladybugs you buy for pest control. http://www.masonbeesforsale.com/

We stocked a few the last time we stocked the pond back in late 90's. They really shine when they come up to feed. Most private hatcheries raise a few of the channel cats for pond stocking. Years ago, I floated a stocking of fingerling brown trout on the Norfork River with the AGFC guys. There were several albinos in the brood we stocked. Hatchery guy said albinism is common, one out of every so many thousand. They just don't last long in the wild. I have seen an albino trout while floating the Spring River in Ark once, he was average stocking size and did not take my lure.

Lettuce and radishes have come up and are looking fine. I am going to try my first beehive this year if I can get a start of bees. Last few years, plants have bloomed and bloomed but never produced fruit. I hardly ever see bees pollinating them. So I am getting a hive and the equipment. I will be working with a local beekeeper to get a start of bees. When I get one established, I will split it and move one out to the farm.

And remember on opening morning when you go stomping out in the water in the dark, the holes you were just fishing in C&R season may be over your head. It always happens after they do this to the stream, people go swimming.

I tried to eat a smallmouth one time, it was wormy and tasted like carp. Give me a trophy stream fed trout any day and a smoker.