WHARFRAT

HEY! I resemble that remark!

I think it was last year, a couple of boats had to turn around at the 54 bridge as they couldn't get under it. I saw one go under and don't know how they didn't scrape the bottom.

Kuddos for sticking it out, cause it was nasty humid then. After I came in, my 4 yr grandson wanted to go out with some worms off the dock just after dark. It was a little more tolerable than a few hrs back, but still sweated my rump off. I think I changed clothes 5X's that day. Hope to see ya out there on the Big Niangua. I'm generally fishing areas from HaHa Tonka to Larry Gale. Sometimes I get a wild hair and venture out past the Little Niangua, but not too often. I can usually entertain myself in a 5 mile area. Look for an Aluminum Rt188 Black Ranger with a Merc pushin it. I'll be the one completely covered up. Had some bouts with skin cancer, so Long sleeves, neck gator, big hat, sun gloves. Probably why I hate this time of the year.

Wow, this weekend was brutal for me. I think I'd rather be out there in Feb at 30 degrees with a breeze, than fish in the mid-nineties with what felt like triple digit humidity. Saturday morning wasn't too bad. Went back out after dinner and it was miserable. Worked up a big sweat, just walking to the boat. Got up early Sunday, walked out on the deck and went right back in. I think it was worse than the night before. Starting to yearn for Oct weather! Thumbs up to all you that stuck it out this weekend.

I've caught sauger between the Marshall Rd ramp and 141 bridge.

Hot weather crappie fishing, I try to go back to where I fish in Jan/Feb. I don't do as well as I usually do then, but, keeps me entertained. If you keep any this time of year, its best to toss em directly on ice. I do best pullin cranks this time of the year. No telling what you'll pick up. It's like a smorgasboard of different things! Thanks all for the advise on tubes!!!!!

As much as I fish soft plastics, I've never really fished tube baits. But I just bought a bunch of 1.5" baits, since the shad are running so small around our end of the lake, it's the smallest soft plastic bait I could find right now. So my question is how to you rig them. Just like any soft bait with the lead on the outside, or do you run the lead on the inside of the tube? Just trying to match the hatch, so to speak.

Only fished a few hrs Sat and Sun. On Saturday, started out around docks. Thought I'd start out by shooting the wells. First fish was a solid 17" LM, not really what I was looking for. Couple of docks down, another decent LM. Using ice blue BG Baby Shad. After a couple more smaller bass, finally got a good 12" crappie. Deep in the well almost on the bottom. Fished until 9am, caught 5 crappie, all but one was over 11", numerous bass, mostly small, and about a 5lb drum. (it was fun until I saw it). Sunday it was a different story. No strikes the first hour, but I did see some fish that would occasionally bust into some shad, wasn't sure what they were, as I saw gar surfacing all morning. I got close to some shad, and could see how small they were and finally saw something silvery chase them. I started looking thru my tackle (which I take very little out with me), I finally found some 1" maybe 1.5" stinger shad in a orange/brwn/chartreuse color. (only thing I had that small). Hooked it up with a 32oz round jig head #6 hook, and started casting around any surfacing shad I could find. I'd let the jig fall about 4-6 ft, before bringing it through the shad. Seemed to do the trick, though, I wasn't happy with the size. In the next hour, probably caught 20+ crappie (7-8") and a couple of really small white bass. But, it was good entertainment before church! Water temp around my end was anywhere from 81-83. Good Fishing Everyone!

Welcome to the Site!!!! and Thank you for your Service!!!!

Ditto on the #7 Flicker shad. Caught more on Chartruese Pearl color. Shad Raps work good as well. I have been hearing some eyes taken in HaHa Tonka cove in the last month. For me, I don't really go after them until late Sept thru Nov. October being best for me. I've also done better trolling a bit faster than I usually do for crappie. 2.5 - 2.8 mph compared to under 2 mph. Work all the humps from in around the 54 bridge back to HaHa Tonka. I've also had just as good luck fishing mid-day compared to evening. Plus you'll catch a lot of other species too. You'll want to troll deep enough that you'll kiss the bottom from time to time. Let us know how you did!

Yeah, I wouldn't be doing much swimming, unless your talking about the pools. Plus, they shut the electricity off on our docks, so no problem lowering you boat, but you better have strong lungs if you want to lift it back up! Might just be a weekend to sit around and have a few man sodas!

They are shutting down the power to our docks until the water level subsides

I haven't heard any decent reports coming out of Simpson in quite a while. I only live a few miles from there, so I talk to a few people that's been out there, but they haven't had anything good to say. I did talk to someone, that fished a couple of subdivision lakes off of Baxter Rd, that said he was catching quite a few bass and some decent catfish. But I don't know the rules about fishing there. He said, as long as MO conservation stocks it, then it's open to anyone. But one of the lakes he was talking about, I drove by, there were signs posted that the lake was only for property owners of the subdivision, plus, I really didn't see any access other that walking thru someones yard to get to the lake. I don't think I would want to hassle with this, if I knew I would be in the wrong. There's other places to go wet a line.

Most of mine are caught late September thru October. Best bet --- Trolling cranks. I have used bottom bouncers with night crawlers, no success, unless you are into catching drum. I have never really targeted them any other time of the year. If I catch them late winter/early spring its by accident while crappie fishing. Most of the big fish seem to come during the middle of the day. My best day for numbers was 2 years ago in the fall, my wife, son, and I caught 5 keepers between 18-21" and one short. All in about an hour and a half right before dark, trolling crankbaits. I will say this last march, I caught a fair number of really small walleye (under 10") while crappie fishing. So I feel that's a good sign.

Welcome to the lake and more importantly, Welcome to the site!

Got to get out early Saturday morning. Fished from 6am to 8am before family showed up. Pretty good day for just under 2 hrs fishing. Boated 10 crappie. All quality fish. Just one under 11" and one over 13". Bobby garland baby shad swimrs, licorice/chartreuse. Pulled crankbaits for about a half hour with no luck. Most of the bites came shooting docks with the strike coming at the end of the well between the lift and my boat, down about 10-12'. Lite bites, just felt something heavy. Other fish came fishing deep structure about the same depth. Overall, only caught about twenty fish, but at least half will fry up!

Pretty windy weekend, though the mornings were fairly calm, just raining a bit, but not too bad that you couldn't fish. Started out early Saturday, heard the crappie were off the banks in about 4 ft of water. Found a few that way, but for the most part, all were under the legal length limit. Since it was calm, I was throwing 32nd oz jigs. Once the wind came up, went to 16th oz, but the fish became un-interested my jig at the 4 ft spots. Wound up keeping 1 fish around 10", probably caught 30-40 dinks. Went in, had a little breakfast, wife wanted to go out. By now the wind blowing pretty hard. Found a couple of spots where you could hold the boat. Not much luck, started looking elsewhere. Thanks to my downimaging HB, started noticing trees/brush anywhere from 10-18 ft that were loaded with fish. Spent most of the next 3 hrs fishing some of these spots. I bet we caught 100+ crappie, but only boated 3, that were between 9-10". The bite was pretty light, but probably because they were so small. I went up to a 8th oz jig fishing straight down on top of the brush, the wife stayed with the 16th oz, didn't seem to make a difference. Color didn't seem to make much of a difference either. I was using something dark and chartreuse, she was fishing white and chartreuse. Went back out right before dark for about 2 hrs, didn't catch as many, wife did manage one just over 12", but that was the only one you could stick in the livewell. Sunday was about the same, nothing but dinks. I did see a boat which was fishing minnows in exposed brush, I did see them put a couple in their livewell, but don't know how well they were doing at other times. Water temp was in the high 60's to just over 70. Water was fairly clear. Lot of junk floating in the water. It was like a maze on Saturday going down the lake. Sunday was better.

Nuttin but a little moss growin around the edge.

Couldn't get down to LOZ this weekend, so I had a couple hours early Saturday morning. Didn't feel like driving thru Busch, so started out at Fire lake and walked to a couple ponds near it. I think Fire Lake was burning hot. Wish I had brought my baitcaster with a buzz or spinner bait. I just had my ultralight with some 16 & 32nd oz jig heads and some bobby garland baby shad. Started out catching a couple small bass right next to the shore, then casted parrellel with the bank and hooked an extremely nice bass, easily 18-19 inches. Couldn't finish the job though, my fault for being too nonchalant. The bigger gills were also biting pretty good. Caught about 7-8 big ones, like the one in the pic. There's a couple of ponds straight back from Fire Lake. I've never done anything on those two ponds, not sure if there are any fish in there. Waste of time. Then I walked to a little pond back towards Prairie lake. It's tucked in the woods. It wasn't bad, nothing big, small bass, small gills. The area you need to fish is hard to access. Did see a pretty good size carp hanging out in the shallows. Wasn't interested in my jig. Ended up by stopping by Prairie Lake. Didn't stay long, lake was fairly murkey, you could even say muddy. But, for what little time I was there, caugh two small gills and two small crappie. And when I say small, I mean under 5". It was good to get out there, wish I would have had more time.

Rams could use that one to sure up their offensive line!

Don't know about anyone else, but 2015 hasn't been good at all on the Big Niangua. Probably the best week for me has been weekend of Mar 14th. But still wasn't as good as years past. Normally the big ens are hangin around for easy pickins, but, while that weekend was good, it was still sub par. I've lived hear for the past couple years, but been coming down a couple times each spring for the last 30 years and this year, by far, was the worst I've ever witnessed. This past week, I never cleaned a limit. Last Sunday, I cleaned 9 fish total. From Monday thru Friday, I boated 5 fish. I fished from our place up to about the 5mm of the BN. I did go out one day with bottom bouncers and minnows, caught one short walleye and about a half dozen drum. The highlight was a 17" spotted bass I caught with my bare hands. Actually it was brought up on my lift when I brought up my boat Today, looked like it was changing for the good. Had to leave for Columbia at 8 this morning, so I walked around our place and in a half hour I caught seven 10-11" males and one 12" female. Males were pretty dark. Oh well, that's the way it goes.

On the Niangua arm, it seems like the males are just starting to stage close to the bank. Still catching decent size females deeper. Males are just starting to get darker. I'd say it's a good week before things get going on this end.

The week of the 19th? Should be able to throw just about anything a catch em. Find structure around back of docks, next to seawall, near the banks. Should be anywhere from a foot to 3 foot. But ----- that depends on what the weather does between now and then. But you still should be able to catch a bunch!

i fought the wind for a couple of hrs on Saturday. Not much luck for me. Bass were hitting pretty good, crappie not so much. I was using a 3" muddy water bait, brown/glow and Blk/Chart. Bass were having a field day with them. In dock wells and on the side of docks, pretty much right off the bottom. Caught a couple small crappie. None big enough. Probably had at least 5 LM you could have weighed, and a couple more not much shorter. Talked to one guy where we live, and he's been catching some decent crappie, (i saw them in his basket) but said, he's only found them off of one dock. I think he's been fishing up close to bridal cave. Water temp this weekend was 42-43. I'd say in a couple of weeks, the big-ens are going to turn on consistantly.