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I am looking to add a couple of new crank bait rods to the quiver. I am looking for a meadium or MH moderate action rod in the 7'0 range... BPS has the Johnny Morris Carbonlite 2.0 on sale right now for $99.00. ($85 if I trade in a rod)... Do any of you have any experience with these rods? Thoughts? Any other suggestions for a cranking rod in the $80-$120 range?

Tons of options on AirBnB- I was looking at them today. I have used VRBO and AirBnB many times- read the reviews and do a little homework and you are almost certain to have a great experience at a good value.

+1 on the 2.8. Sexy shad and blue red pearl... I’m sure some would disagree but I don’t over think the color on those- if it looks shadlike they seem to bite it.

That’s right where we were... Lotta whites and crappie up there but we had a hard time getting them to feed. Water got prettt muddy on Saturday.

Got out of town for the weekend and came to fish the lower end of the lake for the first time ever.... It it was cold. Really cold. It was also windy... which made it feel colder.... but when you have two days to fish you take it come hell or high water. fishing was brutal for us. Couldn’t find any sort of pattern to run or active feeding fish. Add to that running all new water and I just couldn’t put the pieces off be puzzle together. On Friday we ran up the creek pretty far- caught a smallie and spot on a swim bait and lost a really nice smallie at the boat on a jig. Found some fish feeding in the mouth of a little cove and caught a white bass on an A-Rig. Saturday we ran the other way and again found some feeding fish suspended in 80-120 feet of water- but in a point where the wind was blowing hard. I couldn’t really fish it effectively but we did catch one very far white. In the afternoon we ran back up the creek- caught another small spot on a jig. We marked a lot of fish suspended in the channel back there. Couldn’t get anything to buy until I got out the ice jig. Caught 2 crappie there- suspended over 30 feet of water. We marked a ton of scattered fish up the river and after catching those crappie I am pretty sure they were all crappie . All in all a tough cold couple days... but better than a lot of other things I coulda been doing!

"Jewell pro spider jig in okeechobee blue"

I wouldn’t touch the “trout opener” with a 10 foot pole these days.... but when I was I kid I can remember we lived in a small town south of St. Louis. Dad took me to Maramec Springs for opening day... catching a trout seemed like a big deal to me- I had never caught one before.... We got up at the crack of dawn to get there before daylight. It was cold....crowded... and miserable. I made the trip more enjoyable for him by falling in. I remember him taking me to some bathroom to try to dry off. Poor dad- ruined is day I’m sure. But now it is just another one of my good memories of fishing with my Dad.

I wish they would mix it up- why should every event have the same format? I think mixing it up over the course of a season would be fun. Some events like this- some 5 fish limit events. Heck- make one a biggest bass event. Kinda like NASCAR having big tracks, short tracks, and road courses...

Fatty! Great fish! Thanks for the report!

We were at Big M as well. Jerk bait and a few on spoons. Got off the water when it started to rain at about 11. Nothing to write home about- finished with 8 or 9. All smallish k’s. We couldn’t really find any suspended fish or large balls of shad. A few suspended fish off of Viney but they were very scattered. Really wanted to crank some fish and thought it was set up for it but we got no love on the Rk.

Quill: During the flood a last year I launched from IN FRONT of that sign... which made it even funnier...

Around some of them yes- on the main lake but not back in the creek. And not all of them. The Bass seemed to be scattered.

Not much to report unfortunately. I am trying to figure out how to catch fish deep so I stayed comitted to trying it with zero to show for it. On the water at 7. Off at 11. WT 52-54. Hit the main point at Viney and marked fish- also marked a mother load of shad halfway back in Viney. Stuck with spoons, a jig, and a swimmer with no luck. Figuring out how to stay on the fish we were marking was a real battle. BUT it was my first time out with the new Lowrance Hook2 splitshot and I couldn’t be happier with it. In lieu of grip and grins- please see attached sonar images. No fish but fun day trying to learn something new and using the new electronics. If I remember correctly- I think this is the hump right by the boat ramp at BigM-. Halfway back in Viney- middle of the channel Main point of Viney- fish suspended over 52 ft This post has been promoted to an article

Bill: Thanks for the info (as always) and the graph images. Really helpful!

Bo: This is one of the most helpful threads I have read on here- don't have much spooning experience but I want to change that later this week. This is very informative. Thank you. Why I love this forum!

Gotta run the blowers-- and not for 20 seconds either....especially on hot humid still days. When we had an inboard I would prop open the engire compartment a couple of inches with a life jacket whenever we stopped to swim or whatever. A lot of the newer boats will not even start until after the blowers run for 3 minutes. Kinda a crazy story: When I was a kid we were at LOZ once and an old wooden hulled cabin cruiser caught fire right in front of us. 2 people jumped into the lake and one dude went down into the cabin to try to save "Toby". Well, that guy ended up having to squeeze out of a very small port hole to get out of the boat because the fire burnt up that wooden boat faster than you can imagine. We picked all of them up out of the water in our boat- they were all crying for "Toby." I was scared to death thinking someone was stuck in that boat... Took us a couple of minutes to get them to calm down enough to tell us that Toby was a dog. He didn't make it out of the fire which is sad, but not nearly as sad as what we thought had happened. It can happen quickly!

For sale: Like new PSE surge bow. Will include 8 arrows, case, and target. Asking $400 or will trade for a 5 inch or larger CHIRP sonar. Bow has been shot 20-30 times total. I bought it new 2 years ago, sighted it in and practiced 3 or 4 times and shot a deer on the 2nd day in the stand. Haven’t shot it since. Built a house on our property and so I no longer hunt there. It really is in perfect shape. This is the black skullworks pattern which I always loved. The Surge has a very smooth draw cycle, rated for an IBO speed of 320 FPS, has tunable limbs that give you 30# of adjustment range. This is a 70lb bow so your adjustment is 40lbs to 70lbs. Sight, stabilizer, custom sling, rest, peep sight- everything included. Ready to shoot!

Epic morning! 4 hours of topwater action is about all a fisherman can ask for!

Well played!

Back when we had a wakeboard boat we kept it at Rocky Branch. It is much less crowded than Prarie Creek and for swimming and hanging out we liked that area of the lake a lot more. Little farther drive but car gas is a lot cheaper than boat gas! Never had any issues with security up there. Never got too crowded. So- I can say we had a good experience there. On the the other hand- if I was looking for a place to put my fishing boat I probably would look for the marina closest to the places I like to fish....

There are a lot of people here with way more experience than me but here is my .02 after the last two days up at Big M. Get in the water early and check long tapering main lake points and in front of deep docks near the main lake for topwater. Walk the dog baits were the only thing we could really get them to eat. Use your electronics, find shad, fish that area. If they are not hitting top then throw a 2.8 or 3.8 swim bait around the shad. Let it fall on semi-slack line and give it a slow retrieve. During the day- if you have some wind you can catch them on some swimbaits. If not I think the bite gets rough run main lake points and bluff ends and you can probably put together some bites. There were a lot of fish in the buckbrush up the white river. We never caught anything big but it was fun. Buckbrush has to be on or very close to the main lake. We didn’t get bites back in the coves. I’m still learning how to fish this lake too... biggest thing I can say is use electronics to find the bait right now. And remember that bright sunny skies with no wind makes the Rock a lot tougher to fish!

My brother and I fished Big M Friday and this morning. In spite of “terrible” weather (bright and sunny, zero wind) we absolutely crushed it in terms of numbers- including about 20 minutes of the most epic top water frenzy I have ever fished . But the bigger fish eluded us. Friday we were on the water at 06:00. Dense fog- I was in the boat while my brother backed me down the ramp. The first topwater fish of the trip was in the boat before my brother got back to the courtesy dock. Proceeded to fish a mix of top water and swim baits until the fog burnt off and the sun was high. Trash fished for a while but kept catching fish (including a very nice keeper eye on a tube jig at 2:00 in the afternoon). Finally put together a really fun pattern of throwing flukes into main lake buck brush. Caught fish all during the day that way. Knew we probably wouldn’t catch big fish that way but it was just a lot of fun. About 4:00 we headed back towards Viney and all hell broke lose. We picked up some swim bait fish (including 3 walleyes) then at about 5:00 the surface activity got insane. We caught fish after fish- mix of smallies and spots- in one 20 minute stretch it became the most aggressive topwater feed I have ever seen. We had multiple timesp we both caught fish and it topped off with a double. Stayed at Viney ripping from 5:00 to about 8:00 when the bite died off. Final tally for Friday: 69 fish, including 5 eyes, a bunch of smallies, some fat spots. It was a blast. This morning we posted up at Viney at 5:30. Lots of surface activity but much more weary fish. We still managed to catch a few- a mix of whites, smallies, and spots. Managed a few other top water fish running up the lake. Sun was out, wind was nowhere to be found and we finished the morning catching a few thrown jigs on bluff ends. Nothing to brag about in terms of size but we came home with sore thumbs and that’s pretty awesome. As always- thanks to everyone who posts detailed reports and techniques here- it helps those of us who don’t get out as frequently get to the lake with some idea of what is going on and how to find fish. I love this forum. This post has been promoted to an article

Awesome Quill. Beaver seems to be fishing better than it has since I moved here 9 years ago. Love seeing the Bronze Ninjas looking healthy!