BFTMASTER

Well, I made it out with my dad, brother, my nephews (7 & 9) and my kids (1 1/2 & 3 1/2), therefore my long stick never got strung up. Got there Sat afternoon to see that the river was rising again. The boys had a blast with PB until the river was running to hard. The dam kept sounding the horn and pushing a little bit more water each time. Plenty of fish hitting the surface everywhere when the water was rising. You never realize how many trout they stock until they all hit the surface at the same time. 1/4 mile up and down stream looked like someone was throwing handfuls of gravel. Anyhow, the young ones caught enough to clean and have a fry (they loved that they did the catching this time) I know it is a PB report, but I will move them up when I have there interest and patience built up.

Has anyone been down lately? Surely there is some new crisp gear that has been out. Heading down next weekend and just looking to see how it has been. Happy New Year fellow Ozark Anglers!!

Fish near the cleaning tables. We always see and catch really nice rainbows near the cleaning tables. Slow bounce a white jig around cleaning time. Sounds unsportsman as can be, but we always release our nicer fish anyhow. Jigs tend to catch me nicer raindows than most other methods. Seems my big stick baits get slammed from tiny fish just as much as nicer fish.

Sounds like someone needs to sneak up to that boat ramp @ white hole with some streamers one night. (Don't forgot to leave the flashlight at home)

I have good luck with the marabou jigs that I order from Lilley's. Favorite colors are orange/brown, scuplin/olive, white. I don't know about you guys but I flatten my barbs on my jigs and feel like I get many more hook-ups and less misses. I use Falcon Original 6'6" light action for my jigs with a Shimano Stratic 1000 and Seaguar 4lb. Flourocarbon Maybe I should try out the nanofil

Thanks for the report, and glad you guys had fun.

I did really well in area 3 bouncing 1/4oz. brown and orange jigs in the off colored water. Kept (4) really nice trout in about an hour for the family. Really nice fishing the area with only three other people. I did feel really bad for the people that were trying to enjoy camping when that flood hit, can't imagine having to pack up in a straight down downpour. All over the road and grass was thousands of sculpins and crawfish stranded and drying out in the sun. Found someones nice hotdog/marshmellow sticks. If they can tell me the campsite the were left at, I will gladly ship them, no charge.

I wonder how many trout were automatically stocked with the hatchery flooding like it was? Looked like a couple runs got flushed. Outside the park should be good for a while too!

Big water is when I start chunking big stick baits, for spinning I prefer heavy clean flows. Caught some really nice fish a couple of years ago when the river was running all spring long. I have always done well nymph fishing the eddy lines, got to use plenty of shot to get down.

There is bass in the white, I spotted a bunch of kentuckies or spots near the state park while I was over there a couple of weeks ago. I have caught walleye, crappie, small mouth and kentuckies all around Gastons to the State Park. Targeting them would likely be a boring day though.

Left Tulsa Wednesday Night and arrived at Rivercliff Cabins around 11:30. Water was off and really low, so my traditional night fishing arrival night, did not work out very good as it has in the past years. Next morning awake to approx. 2 units or 1200-1500cfs. Loaded up the boat and headed up to the State Park area. The clouds from the storm had not left yet, so it was rather brisk and windy. The overcast skies are my favorite for fishing the white. I don’t know why but I always have pretty good luck when it is overcast. Started of bouncing 1/8oz white jigs. First couple of drifts produced some really decent rainbows for the livewell. It was hard to keep the wind from pushing us into the rocks across from the State Park. We kept having to start the motor to straighten out the drift. On the forth or so drift, I was casting up near the shore and bouncing the jig through the boulder gardens into deeper water when I got nailed. This fish set the hook for me and almost took the rod out of my hands. Immediately, the fish took off toward the front of the boat and jumped right in front of my buddies. I was taking it easy because I only fish with 2lb. test. Finally, after several heart pounding runs that I thought for sure he was going to break me off in the rocks or logs, he came along side the boat. Such a beautiful Brown Trout! His colors were bronze to copper and darker but yet more vivid than many of the other German Browns that I had caught in years past. He measured about 19.25 inches and weighed 2.64 lbs. That is really a baby when it comes to Brown Trout, but to me a trophy memory and an exciting one at that. He swam away cool as could be…like nothing ever happened. The very next drift, in the same general area, I hook and turn another Brown. This one was much bigger. He made a good run and then rolled right on top throwing the jig and letting all four of us see how big he was as he went back to his lair. His tail looked as broad as a broom, and his mid section resembled my upper leg. Everyone in the boat agreed he was at least 6-7 lbs conservatively and probably closer to 8-9lbs. But who will ever know? It is things that happen like that, cause me to purchase hundreds of dollars in fishing equipment. The rest of the morning was rather uneventful, except I was catching a good amount of chunky rainbows that seemed to want some exercise after not having much running water this year. At lunch time we visited the State Park Store and talking some great guys working in there. They showed us some buoyant spoons made by Thomas. We bought several and headed back out on the river. These spoons really seemed to work great in the cloudy conditions, especially if you threw them up shallow and just reeled them med. fast back to the boat. In the deeper water the fish would hit the spoons on the initial drop. These spoons were great and everyone (all skill levels in the boat) were doing well with them. I will always have a selection of spoons in my box from now on. Later in the afternoon we started catching some really nice rainbows on Rapala cd-5 in the Brook Trout and Rainbow Color. I would cast them out into deeper water, count to ten and lightly jerk them as I reeled all the way to the boat. In the late afternoon we anchored above the shoals at Cane Island and let some of the guys finish their limits with Sunrise and Pink colored PowerBait. Day two we concentrated on fishing jigs and drifting. The river ran about the same. The sun was out though, and the spoons did not seem to work as well, perhaps to much bling as well as white jigs were completely shut down. We caught some nice browns drifting from the last shoals at the State Park down to Cane Island. We saw a couple of monsters holding in the shallows, but they were not interested in our jigs. Ended the day with some fat 15-17” rainbows that fell to Sculpin/ginger and Brown/Brown 3/32oz. jigs. Day three we wake early excited to get up to the state park, but there was no water!! Spent the Day around the dock trying to match the hatch on the flyrod. Unfortunately, the little white caddis flies were bouncing up and down on the water and the fish were tearing them up…only problem was I could not make mine bounce on the water like that! We did okay with powerbait and a few on jigs, but nothing like the days before. All and all a great trip with good friends, good food and great little cabin. Special Thanks to Eric and Connie with www.rivercliff.com they are so laid back and easy to deal with and have really done some great things to the cabin. If you enjoy reading these reports please contribute your report, there are plenty of us who enjoy them, especially before a trip. Tight lines to all --BFT

Fishing was good from daylight till about 9:00. They blew the horns and actually started to run some pretty heavy water. Enough to get out of the river. Early the fish were hitting black midges with black glass bead head. Even though it was overcast, the chrome head was 2nd favorite. Had a couple really nice fish on, but no land. Not as many people as I have seen in the past months, mainly Power Bait crowd. Shut water off around 11-11:30. Fish did not bite well in between opening and closing. Once the river settled down, the fish started feeding again.

Thanks guys for the reports, since it will be a couple of weeks before I can head down again.

Okay guys, parking lot is full every weekend and nobody has a report?

Something to keep in mind.... Look for active fish, if you are not seeing fish surface occasionally then move to where they are. On sunny days the fish will hold tighter in the deeper holes and overcast days they feel more secure and spread out more, not saying you won't catch fish in shallow flats on a sunny day, just that my theory holds true for me.

Did you go today?

Anyone know if the Lodge is open through the winter? I would like to C & R all day with a nice hot shower

pictures always help

If I were going this weekend I would take some black dry flies that represent the midge in adult stage. Last Sat. the wind was fairly calm and fish were hitting everywhere on top. Other wise black and zebra midges. Copper bead head if it is sunny and chrome bead if cloudy or overcast. Fish your indicator up about 24"-36" with no weight other than the beadhead. Fishing other patterns than the dark midges and you will probably catch about a 1,000 of the aggressive little browns they just stocked. The rainbows I cleaned and pumped their stomachs were full of little pupa midge type insects. Did not start consistently catching rainbows until I tied the zebra midge on, everything was getting hammered by the tiny browns. I hope a couple of those grow smart and into big boys, but they will have to learn to hide, cause the stripers and such are going to eat them like popcorn until they are closer 10" or so. Then their only other problem is oxygen and staying away from the stinky powerbait.

There was a fair amount of people today, but I think several of the trucks in lot were for the clean up. I really appreciate those folks out there picking up the trash that Litterbugs leave and some day when I have time I will join the cause. Midges were 18 and 22, the smaller the better Also, on these overcast days those fish feel a little more secure and spread out onto the flats instead of hangin in the deeper holes. Many of the rainbows we caught today were in less than 18" of water.

Hit watts at daylight. Horn sounded around 7:00 and they ran just enough water to drift slowly. Thousands of 4" to 6" Browns (Striper Candy) Caught some decent rainbows 10" to 14". Pumped stomach and found small black midges. Put on Zebra Midge and continued to miss hundreds of strikes do to lack of practice. Still caught plenty and had good fun.

i think you can check it out in the tackle store at lilleyslanding.com

Looks like area one is open year around and available for reservation, might be nice to have a little power too!

This snake gets it head bashed in by people thinking it is a copperhead. we used to catch them when I was a kid. sometimes they would strike and sometimes as calm as a pet

About an hour to hour and half after generation those fish will find the eddys and stack up. I have had no water jack my trips more that generation.