Seth

We started at midnight. It was lights out snagging too. Two boats with three people in each boat all limited out. I boated five fish, three short and two keepers. My two keepers were both pigs. One was a 70 pounder that was 48" from eye to the tail fork and had a 35" girth. The other was an 80 pounder that was 50" from the eye to the fork and had a 40" girth. This is my new personal best spoonbill. I didn't get a picture, but I caught one spoonbill that probably wasn't a foot long counting the bill and all. That's the smallest spoonbill I've ever seen. From what I could tell, everybody was catching fish. There were tons of boats all up the down river. You could hear fish beating around in boats and splashing from people having them hooked everywhere. We were worried it would be slow snagging due to the cooler water but it was definitely the opposite. Here's my pics. The night time pic is of the 70 pounder and the daytime pic is of the 80 pounder.

Good luck. We launched at Bridgeport and head up towards Walnut Springs. Six of us in two boats all limited out. I had the opening day of snagging ever. I boated three short paddlefish and two keepers. The keepers were hogs too. One was a 70 pounder and the other, my personal best, was 80 pounds. Here's some pics. Nighttime pic is the 70 and the daytime is the 80.

Your welcome to come snag with us any time Troutfshn. Ed's wanting to do some snagging also. Maybe we can all get together and snag together again. That was a blast last year. I just hope you don't expect to catch them like that every time haha. I've already told Ed he'll be VERY dissapointed if he expects that every time. What kind of boat are you going to have? If you snag down in the normal areas around Flat Creek a prop is fine and better because you don't lose the horsepower.

We are heading up to Bagnell that day to try snagging some spoonbill. If anybody is going to be up that day, I'll be in a 1648 F&F with a 50hp Yamaha jet on the back. I'll report back on this thread after we are done. We are also going to try for crappie, whites, hybrids, and maybe catfish if I can get some shad.

The access at 63/50 is the MariOsa ramp. Up river from there is a lock and dam. You can't pass through it at all as far as I know. Hybrids have been hit or miss lately. One day you might find a pocket of them and do pretty well and then not catch a one the next day. The mouth of the Maries and up by the lock usually are good spots to find them, but sometimes they are just spread out and you can do is cover a lot of water until you find them. I'm not too sure on catching crappie or catfish in that area, but my buddy did say he watched a big blue hording shad at the mouth of the Maries one day last week.

We were spin fishing. Not sure what size line the girlfriends dad had on, but I use strictly 2lbs fluoro or Maxima. Trout were hugging the surface of the water and usually fishing is tough when they do that. I had to use some different techniques to finally get the fish to bite for me. Floating powerbait on the surface was one of them. Fish were biting extremely light even at the buzzer. I'd say I'd miss or hook but not land 3 fish to every one I caught and I only caught five.

Well boredom got the best of me so I hooked the boat up and headed up to the MariOsa. With it being so windy I just did some trolling with crankbaits. Right of the bat I caught a nice kentucky about 15" long so I thought it would be a good day. Didn't catch anything else for a while so i went to the mouth of the Maries and graphed a bunch of fish at the mouth so I figured it was shadl. I took the throw net out and went to tossing around and all I could catch was little crappie about 6" long. I ended up putting a tube jig on and catching a few just to say I caught more than one fish the whole trip. There was a spot down river between the two power lines that was about 15' deep and about 40 feet off the bank where my graph would black out with fish in the bottom 8' of water. I'm wasn't hybrids because I trolled through that area several times with cranks and never got anything. I could feel the crankbait bouncing off whatever it was everytime I trolled through them. Any idea's what they might of been? My guess was asian carp because I snagged several in that same location when the water was up last year during snagging season.

Took one of my little cousins and my girlfriends dad down for the buzzer this morning. We started out just up from the Lacy Hole and had a tough time catching fish. Eventually we moved up to the pond hole and I was able to limit out, but my girlfriends dad only got one and cousin got skunked. My dad and buddy went this evening down there and both limited out. He said it was still pretty tough for the most part.

Glad you could verify that all the paddlefish have been caught from the river. Guess we need to change locations for opening night.

I'll have to try the jigging spoon technique like you mentioned, it sounds like a good way to catch anything that swims up there. Last year during gigging season I noticed that the hole just below the bridge in front of that old barge or whatever it is was just loaded with fish of sort. My graph would literally black out from the bottom to about 15' up. I just assumed it was asian carp or paddlefish. As soon as snagging season started, it stopped doing that though.

I fillet everything, even trout. The little rib bones that you guys are talking must cook up when I fry or bake my trout because I've yet to get stuck by one. The only fish that I've had bone problems with are suckers if I don't score them well enough or fry them long enough.

McCords Bend is the first town up river from the Walnut Springs boat launch. Get on Google Earth and just search for McCords Bend.

We had a blast from Nixa on up to the dam with the high water last year. I've never caught so many paddlefish before in my life. I'm about 3 hours away so I can't really go up there and check on it, but I was just curious if any of the fish winter or get trapped up there. I'll be down opening night and probably start out around Walnut Springs if anybody else is going to be down.

We didn't catch any big ones, but did both bring back a limit. My girlfriend handled the cold much better than I had anticipated. It didn't feel nearly as bad as I thought it would be. I think I landed 7 before I kept my fourth fish and she kept the first four that she caught so she could go back to the truck and sit in the warmth. Had a great time and sounds like she really enjoyed her first opening day also. Trout are cleaned going to be fried up here directly....mmm...mmm....good.

Looks like it's going to be a chilly one in the morning. Weather.com says it will feel like 7* at 6am and 10* at 9am. BRRRRR!!!! My girlfriend is not going to like that one bit...LOL. No waders for tomorrow. I'll be decked out in the camo bibs and parka and camo stocking hat.

I've never seen the water as low as it is in your pictures. I really like the pictures. I do pretty well on the hybrids, whites, spotted and largemouth bass up there. THere are several guys that catch some whopper crappie in that area but I've yet to find them. We have landed a few small walleye fishing for hybrids, but lots of people target them up there so the walleye fishing must be decent. Usually we make a few trips there to snag spoonbill and asian carp and do pretty good. Last year wasn't that great for us on the Osage for some reason. Guess the high water had everything in different locations than what I'm used to.

When the water is running you can slay the hybrids there. Usually catch them at the mouth of the Maries River or up at the lock and dam he has in the pictures.

They always shut it way down on the weekends though. I wish it ran hard on the weekends because that faster water really get's the hybrids and whites biting good near MariOsa.

I was just curious if there were any paddlefish left up there. I've heard there are always a bunch in there when snagging season opens up but get cleaned out fast.

I asked him if he got them near the lock or the mouth of the Maries, but he said anything yet. Usually always find the hybrids in either of those spots though.

Glad to hear you got in to the fish. A guy on another forum said he fished the Mari Osa yesterday and hammered the whites and hybrids. Looks like I might have to run up there this Saturday and freeze my rear off if the hybrids are there. Hopefully Bagnell will keep running some water.

Thanks for the info. I've never been on the river directly above the lock and dam. Where do you put in to get to that section of the river? Isn't Wardsville the next public launch ramp? That's a ways up river. I wanted to go fishing so bad last night, but I just ran out of daylight so I just put in at 89 on the Gasconade and ran a few riffles. It was great to run the boat and not freeze my butt off.

As far as I know, you can run from the MariOsa to the Missouri with a prop. There's some pretty shallow water, but if you can stay in the channel you are fine. I might be wrong though because I haven't actually made that run because I just put in at Bonnotts Mill if I want to fish near the Missouri. Wardsville has the shallow riffle up near the sand plant and I can't remember if it's passable with a prop or not when the water is off at Bagnell. Most everybody I know that runs the Osage a lot runs a jet. They don't have to worry about those shallow spots. If it aint sticking out of the water you can run it is how I look at it.

Well it sounds like the girlfriend and her dad are for sure going with me. My ol man hasn't gave me a for sure answer yet and neither has one of my buddies. Who's ready for a stale donut?

My buddy caught an 18.5" largemouth and an 18" smallmouth on the Osage River on President's day this year. That smally was a pig! It was twice as wide as the largemouth.