zipstick

Agreed with your ideas and patterns, but the absolute best bait to use for postspawn bass is a white fluke skipped behind docks. First, this is the easiest bait to skip way back under wires. Second, bass eat the heck out of it, and last, with a single hook, it doesn't put out eyes of cut gills nearly as often as a topwater. The only downside is the cost, so I like to shop hard and I usually find them for $2 a bag if I am vigilant.

I pretty much agree with Agnew. Go any time you can above 37 as a general rule of thumb. I taught Al and Mitch most of the nuances of winter smallie fishing, and both of them learned well. The learning never stops and yesterday was a great example of remaining flexible in one's approach. Ordinarily, with the water conditions presented yesterday, Nov 30, my assumption was that my little black maribou hair jig and trailer would have been a lock to catch some real good smallies. Not so. Mitch began with a Megabass and I picked up an OSP jerkbait. He and I whacked the big smallies pretty good. Had 6 jerkbait smallies over 17 inches, and one more on Mitch's really cool crawfish. Nothing over 18.5 though. I could muster just one medium smallie on the hair jig in the 43 degree water with 3.5 feet vis. You never when those smallies will be looking up for a jerkbait. As to why the jig was a poor choice, I'll never know. And as the water warmed to 45, I even caught a couple on spinnerbait. Keep the jerkbait and the small jigs ready all winter. If they will bite at all you will be prepared. I imagine Mitch will post some pics when he reads this.

The MDC reports are a joke. They have been for years. Even when they get the conditions correct, the "how" to catch fish is laughable. Of note was the report way back in the early 90's when our bass club was ready to travel to Norfork lake for our opening event in Feb. The report published in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch said that the shad kill was enormous, and fishing was poor, and anglers should not try to fish the lake. At the club meeting two days before the tournament, members discussed changing the lake or postponing the event, but we decided to go ahead and travel all the way to Norfork and catch little or nothing. We didn't see a shad kill, but we did catch lots of limits of bass. Some of the best angling w'ed ever had! Like Al, get familiar with the Corps River conditions and the USGS plots. I check them especially when travelling out of state to areas that I have no reliable contacts. If you can find pretty normal conditions, you'll catch fish if you have the skills to do it. For lakes, the best approach, if you have no one to talk with is to check the latest bass tournament results for the lake you are planning to fish. And just don't assume that you'll catch the winning weight! Instead, figure out how most of the field did when fishing hard for 8 hours. If 40 entrants or teams out of the 50 entered had limits, that's the best report you can find! AIA, Joe Bass, Heartland, CPA, and Bass World do a good job of reporting their reults in a fairly timely manner.

Gavin, Here's some content for you. Perhaps the most successful smallie bait in wintertime based on winning local river tournaments the past three years has been the smallie beaver (watermelon) fished on a Chompers stand up head. Just thread on this small piece of plastic, put in the right place and go catch them. Cottrell could back this up for you.

Regardless of any shad die off, I've always caught them better at Lake O. when the temps ranged from 47-42 and going down. When the temps get south of 40 it gets harder for most of us. I doubt you could offer any help, but do post pics if yuou get some big uns.

Al, looks like the weather is going to hurt us for at least two more weeks. Remember, a sparsely tied hair jig is a fish catching jig. I was really catching the largies good at Lake Ozarks up until last week on jerk baits. The temps there have probably cooled to 40, so that bite is about to dry up too. Had several 30+ days and some good ones too.

Sorry you miss my pics. We've only had a handful of good days to go this year, and I caught them good, but nothing over 21. Maybe a dozen between 18-20. It's too cold (water temps) unless you want to sit near a spring hole, and that's a litle too easy. If I get one 22 or over, I'll post, but the long term forecast says not to hold your breath.

If our drum taste like redfish, I'm never gonna to eat a redfish.

In a pinch take some brown yarn from a cloth store, cut into lengths and comb it out gently to make a purty dern good hair jig. Caught some good ones on them this week. If there's fish to be caught where you cast and work the small jig slowly, I don't think there's too much difference in the hair or fur. Most guys just use too much bulk in the jigs they use in cold water.

Go for it if the water is above 40, they will bite out of the current. I guided the last two days where the water temps were 41 and 39. Both days were good for bass, but I did catch more in the 41 degree water. Totaled 37 bass with a few picture taker brownies. I'd start and stay with a tiny hair jig. Deep and slow! If the water temps are below 38, don't expect to catch anything.

[ Remember the SOB...Small Okiebug? It was made by somebody in Oklahoma and was one of the first long arm tandem spins. It was one of my two favorite spinnerbaits for a long time. The other was the Little Jewel, which was made by a company in Florida, I believe, and instead of a lead head it had a spinner blade soldered to the area where the arm and hook joined. You could reel it dead slow and it would still stay up and wake the surface. Billy Phillips out of TN made the Little Jewel.

Martin, the Spider spin was a maribou jig fastened below two small colorado blades like the old Shannon twin spin. Virgil let it fall and fluutter down the bluffs in the Ozarks lakes. You can find out more about twin spin fishing today from Agnew. He does it a lot.

Speaking of McKinniss....He graduated from Ritnour HS in St. Louis, and aloways fancied himself as a Cardinal fan. He knew Whitey Herzog pretty good too.

Didn't ever know about Dallas. Did he fish the Ozarks lakes primarily? Did he ever fish with Same Welch? And while we're at it, the earliest produced fishing shows I can remember in fresh water were of Verne "Gadabout" Gaddis, the Flying Fisherman. He started a radio fishing show in the '30's before there was TV, and was creted with the first fishing televised show in the 1950's. Unfortunately, he lived along the east coast, not in the Ozarks.

THat lateral line looks suspicious for a true smallie.