Seth

Is the Miami Dam still going to be snaggable with all the rain we just got? Everywhere here in MO that I like to snag is extremely high right now so I thought about making the trip down to the Miami Dam and trying to snag some bills. It sounds like it's starting to get good by the way you fellas talk. Can a person by a fishing license and paddlefish permit anywhere down there or do you have to apply online for the paddlefish permits and stuff? Also I read something about a legacy permit, do I also have to get one of those to snag down there? I'm familiar already with the rules of one barbless hook and only keeping one fish.

Your rigging is basically the same as ours. As for snapping the braid, what pound test and brand of line were you using? We like using 80 lbs Power Pro on our rods. I tried some 50 lbs spiderwire one year, but the thin diameter line gave me fits with wrapping around the bottom treble hook. I wanted to go down to the James again this weekend too but not with the water flooding the way it is. Maybe when it subsides the temperatures will be up close to 60 and the big sows will really be running. That should make for a fun time then.

We pounded the flats just below Ashercane Bottoms and only rolled one fish. Last year we pulled probably 90% of the fish we caught off those shallow flats in less than 10 foot of water. Some of the fish we actually threw onto the bank, drug the hooks into the water and hit them with the first yank. It wasn't like that this year though.

Don, We landed 7 opening night snaggng down there and it was just like you said, everybody was snagging in the same areas and some had more fish than others. I think we snagged from midnight to 6am and caught every fish between 2-3:30 AM. There must of been a heck of a school of fish in the area because it was crazy and then nothing the rest of the night. Out of the 7 fish, only one was a sow and she wasn't very big, only 47 lbs. What are did you guys target? We caught our fish at Ashercane Bottoms where I think every boat in the river was at opening night.

Looks like a white sucker like you see so many of in Taneycomo. They are fun to catch and even better to eat.

Phil will have to move it. Don't worry about it.

We hit all of our fish right as we started the pull and they were also on the bottom hook so they were hugging the bottom pretty close. The funny part was that we would target the fish that were flopping on the surface, but only hit one fish up high. I'm not sure what depth we were fishing because we didn't bring the graph. If memory serves me right the water 20-30 foot deep where we hit them. We never hit anything unless the fish were flopping on the surface though and they only seemed to do it every few hours or so.

I prefer 4-6oz sinkers and 10/0 treble hooks. A lot of people bank snag on Truman in the Schell Osage conservation area. If you get on MDC's website you can look the area up and get directions. I've also heard that people snag from the bank below Taberville bridge and have success. Duckman is a member on this forum and almost always bank snags on Truman and catches some dandy paddlefish.

March 15 - James River arm of Tablerock 12am - 6am Four of us were in the boat. We boated seven fish. It took a while but we found a school of them and landed all seven fish between 2-3am. All the boats were up around the Ashercane Bottoms area and we seen several boats pull in fish. Six of the fish were males weighing 30-40 lbs and the biggest of the night was a sow that weighed 47 lbs. Here's a few pictures of the fish.

I've never snagged Truman for paddlefish, but we tear them up on Tablerock. There are many guys I talk to online that fish Truman and catch a ton of big paddlefish also. You probably can't go wrong either way, it just comes down to which one you know the best.

Wow! Those side imaging units are amazing and they actually show the bill's of the paddlefish. Man it makes you wonder how big that one was! Do you think it could have possibly been two fish trailing each other? Are you able to tell what depth the fish are holding at on those graphs or do you have another 2d fish finder to show that?

Thanks. That's the area we will be focusing on when snagging so I might throw in a spinning outfit just incase I snag my limit early and try for some whites.

I snagged a couple of times at Chain of Rocks last year from the bank. Seen tons of asian carp pulled in and I managed to catch four tiny spoonbill one cold day when I was the only person there. They banned snagging there this year though to protect sturgeon or something so the only other place to bank snag is below Alton Dam. Not much as far as spoonbill get caught there, but if you want asian carp then you can catch one every cast almost and they get them up to 40 lbs there. We mostly snag the Mississippi for the asian carp because they fight just as hard if not harder than a spoonbill and you don't have to worry about having a slow day of snagging those crazy things. They taste awesome if prepared right too. Seth

Good to hear that!! I know the side imaging units have extremely good detail, but does is it good enough to actually show the bill of the spoonbill? I know with regular 2d sonar, you are basically just guessing that the fish is a spoonbill based on location and size. I'm heading down to the James River tonight after work and if it's not storming too bad, will be hitting it at midnight tonight.

Glad to hear that Coyote. Small males or big sows I'm ready to yank in some spooners. Good luck everybody. I should be back Saturday evening so I'll post up on how well we did. Coyote, how do you fish for the whites on the James? I've seen some very impressive stringers of whites boated down there, but have never took time away from snagging to try catching any. I plan on trying for them this year though because the few times I did get into them, it was a blast!

Sounds good! We will be around Ashercane Bottoms tomorrow night at 12am. Hopefully the warmer temps this week will have warmed the water up a bit and improve the snagging.

Let's use this post for all of our snagging reports and plans for 2008. Where's is everybody planning on starting this weekend? I'm going to head down to the James River on Tablerock tomorrow after work and start ripping at midnight. I just hope the weather holds out and treats us nicely.

So the spoonbill are up that far then....that's good to hear. I'm surprised they were flopping on top with the water being below 55. Those water temps are still alot better than what I expected them to be and it's supposed to be mild this week so maybe they will get in to the 50's so that should help out the spoonbill opener next weekend.

I just got my graph last summer so I haven't got to try it out at finding spoonbill. We have just snagged down there long enough that we know which holes usually have fish. I'm going to try snagging on Lake of the Ozarks this year in some tournaments so I will have to figure out how to use it to graph spoonbill for that because I have never snagged on there before.

I wish I was taking my boat down next weekend because I've got a pretty decent fish finder on it. There's a lot of holes between Point 15 and Virgin Bluff's that I would like to graph for early season snagging. We always do our snagging just above Point 15 up to the Walnut Springs boat ramp and do pretty good, but a lot of guys target the lower part of the James and do pretty good from the way it sounds.

Well I forgot that I had bought some 5 minute epoxy a while back just for replacing rod tips if I needed too so I will just use the 5 minute epoxy. This is going to be done to a beat up surf rod that I use for snagging so I'm not worried about looks so I'll just leave the thread be then. I was just curious if it served a purpose other than for looks.

Do you have to wrap thread below the rod tip? If so, should I do that before or after I glue in the rod tip? My last question is, will Power Bond work for installing the rod tip? I use Power Bond for installing inserts into my carbon arrows and it seems to hold really well for my arrows. Thanks, Seth

I've never been there myself either, but I've gotten on there webpage, which is http://www.oldoarhouseinn.com/ and read the directions on how to get there and looked it up on Google Earth and I'm pretty sure I have the right place marked. It's around MM 81 so if you know the mile markers well then I'm sure you could find it right away.

I've never seen them post pictures of derby day fish on that website, just the pictures from kids fishing day.

Good luck and I agree with Dano on the having the time and not going makes your crazy. If you can get in around the bathroom hole on the bluff side, you will catch some fish. That spot had the most fish in the whole stream I would guess, as well as the most fisherman. Being that you are going on a Wednesday, it shouldn't be very crowded compared to this past weekend. Good luck and catch a big one.