LarrySTL

To keep everybody from opening every cooler looking for each item they want about a zillion times a day, you might as others have said, pack the coolers and label the ones that hold the bulk of the food as Day One, Day Two, etc, with something as simple as numbers on a piece of ducttape stuck on each cooler. Designate only a few specific people as being allowed to open those coolers. Also, those frozen 1/2 gallon or gallon plastic bottles of water are ice until they melt, and are cold water to drink when they do melt. Similarly the big frozen bags of pulled pork are ice before they thaw, and then they are dinner. You could add stew, red beans and rice, or lots of other things to the menu the same way and slice potatos for stew, cook rice for the red beans, etc as needed to cut down on the need for cooler space.

Add me to the "as long as they hit it" bunch. Part of that is that I would personally rather catch or have a decent shot at, one or two good fish than a bunch of ten inchers. A buzzbait or a WTD bait gives me that chance. It was easier last week with two good fishermen also throwing an assortment of baits, and if they had started scoring big I might have switched, but I know I said several times "I'll throw it one more hour, and then if nothing hits it, I might change". A frog would have that big fish chance too; that might be getting too much into one specialized rod and reel for a float trip, or it might be showing the fish something they have never seen. Hmmmmm.

I dont know if it was the same ones or not, but yes we did jump their car for them in the morning, and somebody siphoned my gas tank after we started floating. By good luck, I made it to a gas station, but the low gas light was on for more miles than I want to think about. I do like the story about Smalliebigs uncle. I think I may have to adopt an uncle too !

PM sent about our new friends.

One day this past week I was fortunate enough to float the Big Piney with Gavin and Smalliebigs. I had never been on it before, and hadn’t floated as opposed to wading, anywhere in many years. We did a one day, there and back, with Gavin and I in his canoe and Smalliebigs solo in his yak. We floated most of the day, and took out a few miles upstream from I-44. Once again guys, I really appreciated everything. I thought the fishing was ok; they both felt it was pretty slow. They are a lot more used to what results are reaslistic than I am. Consensus was that the BP could use more depth and more current, which is probably true of lots of places lately. Spinnerbaits by two of us and a swimjig by Gavin didn’t do much. After a while I went back to a small jighead with a 5 inch finesse worm on it and had some action though my biggest on that was about 12“. Mr Bigs caught some on 2 or 3 different topwaters and some on an assortment of bottom baits. Gavin got some action on a topwater and occasionally on bottom baits and I put on a Spook, the smallest size one ( 3” ¼ oz ) The SM that hit it were really aggressive although a lot of them still missed the bait. I got a couple 12“ fish on it and one 16” with those coming in or within a foot of current, and either big wood or big rock in the water. I had just enough fish hit it to not put it down the rest of the day. Other assorted adventures were that I had my first time dumping a canoe despite Gavin’s best efforts; we all got to see a nice shiney big yellow truck drive across the river through about 2 feet of water; despite some slight anxiety we did find the take out point and the road back to the put in. Last but not least, the methheads who siphoned my gas tank while we were on the river did leave me (barely) enough gas to get to a gas station. Overall I had a blast, and I now own several more small and medium size Spooks than I did a week ago. Fish porn by Gavin attached, if I can figure out how to do that ! Larry

She's definitely a keeper. The fish is ok too. The music needs to go.

In addition to replacing visibly groved guides, you can take a Q Tip and gently run it's dry tip through the guide or circle it around the inside of the guide. If any little wisp of the Q Tip catches on the guide, thats a tiny rough spot and you should replace that guide too.

If you can use an exposed hook in the places you are fishing them, you can go buy some rubber O rings, slide one of them on where you want it on the worm, and just slip your hook underneath the ring without even penetrating the worm. BPS seems to have one size of these O Rings. If you go to your local hardware store you can buy a small pack of rings, 5 or 10, for a dollar or two, then figure out what size you need. One you know that size, surf the internet a bit and you can buy a hundred of that size ring for a dollar or two.

X 3

I'm glad he released it. I am at least that glad that it was not the overall MO bass record.

or maybe just luck, but either way I'll take it. Saturday I went wading on the upper end of a river about an hour and a half from here that I had never been to before. Its in Tryon's book so it's no secret. I started at one low water access that turned out to be mostly waist - to -chest deep almost stagnant looking water but eventually caught a few small bass and lost about a 12" largemouth on a Tiny Torpedo from a small log jam in a chute with a small amount of current. More undifferentiated steep bank and almost dead looking water above there. So I went back and started driving to each upstream access. I found one with more sloping banks, some current, and perhaps a mile upstream, things funnelled to a narrower chute with some depth and brisk current in it. At the upper end the chute was maybe 3 feet deep, had a lot of those water weeds that look like grass and have small flowers on them, the stuff that covers so many gravel bars. Lots of bass there. Biggest that I caught was a 14 " LM, two 12 " smallies maybe a dozen from 9 to 12", and some dinks. About 1/2 LM, 1/2 SM, no spots, which surprized me. I started with a 4" Roboworm on a light jig head but that was getting expensive fast so I tried a 5" zoom finese worm, which seemed to get as many strikes, and didn't rip as much. I did what everyone's been telling me, long casts, staying back from the fish, etc. A few fish from small slack areas in the chute, the vast majority from the head of the chute. Some, but not nearly as many at the tail of the chute. I ran out of time and energy before I found another spot like that. I am assuming that the current, especially after long slackwater areas, was a conveyor belt of oxygen and food. Its nice to have some success to report.

Congrats to both of you !

If we make it to 65 , those of us in MO do not need fishing licenses

Thanks everybody. I suspect that Gavin has the answer, that I would need to pay the 2 person price, but when I get a location or two I'lll call a coupla places, ask, and I'll report back here.

I'd like to get some float fishing in as an addition to the wading. That's going to mean a canoe rental. I'd appreciate any suggestions about what area to go, or what rental place to use. I'm looking for day trip distance from St Louis, ( 100 miles or closer ?) and a decent rental/shuttle place. Naturally I also want an area with decent fishing for bass, preferably smallmouth. I do have some ability to go on weekdays and I know the summer madness starts about now on weekends. Areas that I know of are basically the Big River around Washington SP ( SP or Cherokee Landing for a canoe, or are their any rentals up around Irondale ?) or the upper Meramec from as far upstream as water permits, downstream as close to St L as you might suggest. Any suggestions there, or other areas within one day range of StL would be much appreciated. Other questions: Am I ok with a standard size two person canoe and just turning it backwards ? Other than a reduction in noise, any particular benefits to renting a non-aluminum canoe ( which I notice is an option with some rental places) ? Anything else I should be thinking about ? Lastly, if anyone wants to split the cost occasionally, or has a canoe and is looking for a second person for an outing, let me know. Thanks.

Its a wonderful book ! I reread it every couple years and have for a long time.

I dont know the answer, but if you follow this link, then click Streamflow in the left column, then scroll about 95 % of the way down the page, you will find 3 locations wtih the information on the JF. http://mo.water.usgs.gov/

I'd join the 2/0 hook folks for that, depending on the hook style, etc. If that doesn't get you significanly better results after a while, you might also try setting the hook a lot sooner. The one other possible factor that comes to mind is if your rod ( gotta watch the wording here).... if it has a great deal of flex, try a faster/stiffer action rod.

Jigging spoons, or zara spooks, on 20 lb line work pretty well

It only applies to residents, sorry. http://mdc.mo.gov/permits/fishing-permit-information

I'm here, or maybe there.

A couple questions if I may for the spinning reel folks using braid. Are you using yellow (or one of the very visible colors) which I am sure helps you see it, or a dark color so the fish cant see it as well ? For leaders, fluoro ( better feel, and it sinking might help with bottom baits but is it a handicap with surface lures?) mono ( we probably all know its pluses and minuses) or one of the poly lines .....and why ? What knot for the braid-to-leader knot ? Thanks Larry

Minnkota or Motorguide, period. I dont know if others are still making T motors now, but even if they are, I would stick with those two. Buy more thrust than you think you might need and if it was me, it would have to have variable speed, or many different speed settings, not just Low Medium High stuff. Please put a circuit breaker on the system very near the battery. There are some good mechanics here who can tell you lots more about the specifics than I can. I'll add that except for a very small boat, trolling motors may be more satisfactory to position the boat than to actually troll for lengthy amounts of time.

The man-killer catfish must have migrated because when I first heard about them, they were just above, or below Table Rock Dam, or maybe both depending on who you talked to. That was the early 70's though so they have had plenty of time to swim there.

Whew, that means I'm not losing it. It looked like the one in Mitch's pic except if we took the lighter bands and moved them to banana yellow, we'd have it. I had wondered if molting could produce strange colors temporarily, but I don't know if thats the case. Thanks.