Seth

Those SI's are so dang cool! We took a guy down there last year that had a 997 on his boat and I spent most of the night driving the boat and watching the graph because it was so much fun! There's no mistaking a spoonbill on them things if they are suspended and throw a shadow. I will be down the first two weekends and staying at Bridgeport. I'll be in a blue Legend SS boat. I'll keep and eye out for you. We'll most likely be up in the Ashercane Bottoms area a few miles up from point 15.

I used chartreuse powerbait and my dad used yellow and rainbow I believe. Usually I fish jigs, but with the water so dingy I figured I'd be wasting my time. The people using lures didn't seem to be having much luck that I noticed.

Most spoonbill when snagged are hooked just barely under the skin. Unless it's a very small spoonbill, there's no way a hook is going to hurt a big fish like that. The meat is over an inch thick on the big ones down on the James. It's just a flesh wound on them. When the fish are stacked up in the holes up river, it's not uncommon to catch spoonbill that already have hook holes in them. They aren't effected by this at all. In Oklahoma you catch and release spoonbill as long as you want but as soon as you keep one you are done. They do require barbless hooks in OK though and not in MO. If I'm really in to the fish then I mash down the barbs. To each there own. I think it's unethical to keep any catfish over 15 pounds personally but most people don't agree with catfish conservation. Why not keep a bunch of small ones to eat versus killing a big one that produces tons of baby catfish compared to the little ones? You can replace a smaller catfish much sooner than a big one. Good fishin everybody! Spring is almost here!!

Spoonbill are stocked every year. I don't think they can naturally reproduce in MO waters due to the dams. Essentially it is the same as catching and keeping trout from a park except they grow a lot bigger. A 100 pound spoonbill is a very old fish, but it's not like it was a wild fish to begin with. Killing a 100 pound spoonbill ain't like killing say a 100 pound catfish because that catfish will naturally reproduce millions of baby catfish. A paddlefish is just a big fish put for the pleasure of us to snag and it doesn't matter whether it's 20 pounds or 150 pounds as far as having an affect on the population of smaller spoonbill. On a side note, I rarely keep spoonbill from the James anymore unless somebody wants one to eat. I just enjoy catching them. If I want some to eat for myself, I will keep them from the Osage below Bagnell Dam or from LoZ. The spoons from the James just have a funny taste to me unless they are smaller and have pure white meat, which I don't know until after I clean them. Most have a muddy looking meat though. I catch more big fish on the James though so that's why I keep coming back.

Man we catch a BUNCH of paddlefish and have yet to catch anything over 85 that I know of for sure. I'd love to catch a triple digit fish one of these days. As for your video, if you want I can work on editing the cuss words for you. I'd love to see it!

Can you elaborate more on this?

It is a lot of work, but catching a fish that weighs 10 times what a huge bass weighs makes it worth the effort! Was that picture from last year Predator? I never did make it up to the honey hole last year and it drove me crazy! My buddies were catching fish like crazy from early April till the end of season. The biggest our group boated was an 85 last year and my buddies dad won that gas station tourney with it.

Have you seen any paddlefish rolling around there this winter? Just curious if any ran up there last year and got trapped until now.

Good report. I'm coming down the first two weekends after snagging season opens to chase paddlefish at night and crappie/whites during the day. I can't wait!

I would love to have seen that 10 pounder in person. The biggest I've actually seen come from there was a 7 pounder on opening day probably 10 years ago.

There was a guy sitting in a lawn chair down by us that took a spill also. I'm not sure how far he went in but we heard some splashing and then he said something about rolling around like a turtle on it's back and everybody busted up laughing. He stayed and fished so he must not of gotten too wet because it was a bit chilly this am!

We fished where the log crosses the river just down from the cleaning station at the farthest parking lot. The fish were sitting on top of the log out in the middle of the river and right next to the bank just below the log. I may have spoke too soon about the great fishing as we went at the buzzer. One of our buddies went down and fished most of the day and said that fishing was really slow so I don't know what to think. I may go back down this weekend and see what happens.

Trout bit great this year. Dad and I each kept our limit and released one. Size was typical for a stocker fish but man did they have some fight in them. We got our tags right at 6am and had number 496 and 497. Attendance seemed to be way down compared to normal. I'd imagine last years lackluster fishing may have something to do with it. If it stays decent like it was today I will be making many more trips down this year.

Dad and I are heading out at 5am tomorrow. We will most likely fish just above the log by the fish cleaning station near the back parking lot. We are both using long BPS Microlite rods. Say hi if you see us. Dad's got a green bucket that he'll be sitting on as well.

Hopefully the storms didn't change it much last night. If it's just high but not flooding, I'll still go down there. Do you think a dark colored jig would still work in dirty water or is it pretty much a dough bait day?

I asked off work tomorrow but am debating whether to bother going or not. Some fried trout sure does sound good and the weather doesn't look too bad either. Wouldn't be my first high water opener but I sure do prefer sight fishing with jigs.

Fished Saturday and Sunday below Bagnell this past weekend and it was dead. I lucked in to a 4# walleye and accidentally snagged a 10# paddlefish on Saturday. Sunday my buddy caught a nice 4# largemouth on a crankbait and that was it. We stopped at St. Elizabeth and fished a bit on our way back home but never caught anything and only had one for sure bite but missed it.

Those are really easy to make. I just use brown popper foam cut to 1/4" pieces. Run a #12 scud hook through the middle of the foam, put a dab of super glue on the middle of the hook and push the foam on to it. Take a brown magic marker and color it brown and you have a fish food fly. They are a lot of fun at the outlets especially for first timer fly fisherman. They are guaranteed to catch a few fish on one of those.

Anybody been fishing at Bagnell recently? I think I may head up there this weekend and bring a smorgasbord of tackle and just see what I can get to bite. My plan is to slow troll for some crappie in the slack water and then work the current breaks for some whites/hybrids. Also want to go scout out a few holes for spoonbill season and see if they are stacked in there or not. I've still got a bag of skipjack left in the freezer I might bring along and try for catfish if nothing else is biting. Surely I can catch something though.

I hope we have record floods come April for snagging purposes. In 2008 when it was really high, the snagging was out of this world. After snagging is over it can go back down though because I hate fishing high water otherwise.

This happened at Cooper Creek years ago. We were just about to head up to the trophy area after launching the boat and the stock truck pulled up. Well we decided to stick around and catch fish every cast for several hours before heading up river and fishing the "sporting" way. I'd be lying if I said I didn't have any fun during that trip catching all those stockers.

It just now opened up from all of the ice is all I know. I've not heard of any recent fishing reports. Sorry

Both links came up fine on Firefox for me.