Lake Taneycomo Report

[Phil Lilley]

Can't post this on the main page for some reason so I'll post it here-

Boy, it's been tough figuring out our generation patterns lately. It looks like we're entering our first spring rain period where about every 3 or 4 days a front and shower move through the area. Man I feel for the people up in North Dakota... we were there just about a year ago. This year though our lakes are at power pool levels -- a good place to start out a possible rainy spring.

Our water has been running alot more than it has not been running the last week. Fronts and showers (and painful memories of April, 2008) are keeping the managers at the Corp second guessing whether they should run alittle today -- or alot! Just like today: their on-line schedule said 3 units in the morning dropping to one unit in the afternoon. In reality they ran 3 units all day... they must have thought, "We better run more water cause we may get more rain than what's forecasted for tonight!" Total speculation on my part. It is frustrating for us guides who have to try to make a plan for the day's trip but we make do.

With the water and wind, fishing- or catching- has been alittle tough. I've seen some anglers in boats anchored in the mouth's of some of our creeks doing rather well. Fall Creek has been a popular place the last few days. I'd say they're tight-lining night crawlers behind the boat. You can tie to or anchor in some of the eddies on the side of the lake or in the mouth of a creek but be extremely careful to think out any possibility that you could come undone and swing into the current. That or your anchor could drag and you could find yourself in heavy current, still with an anchor our. Fast current and anchors lead to serious possibilities. Drifting into downed trees in heavy current is equally as bad. Be very careful!

I have drifted flies on the bottom in the trophy area my last 3 guide trips including 2 full day trips Sunday and Monday and did fairly well. We drifted them two ways... one is straight-line using either a #4 or a 3/0 removable split shot 4-5 feet above the first fly and a second fly tied on in tandem 18 inches from the first. We're using a #12 scud, gray, brown or olive and a #14 red or black zebra. They hit the scud more than the zebra so sometimes we're using two scuds. The other method is under a float. We're fishing the flies 10-12 feet deep. We're also using a pink micro jig, chrome head.

There's only one good area we're finding fish that will bite. This is pretty weird considering I know there are rainbows all over the place in the trophy area. The best drift is over the flat at the Narrows. The Narrows is where the channel swings from the east to the west side of the lake, about a half mile above Fall Creek. There is major bank improvement work being done at this spot- can't miss it. Some of the construction guys cheer us every time we drift by and catch a trout. We drift on down to Fall Creek, picking up one or two on the east side of the lake, off the gravel bar. We're catching alot of rainbows under 12 inches -- so if you're having trout catching 4 to take home and eat, buy you a few scuds and head up to this area and drift a fly instead of power bait and you'll do ok. We did land several over 15 inches too but not many.

Over the weekend, our guests did catch trout below Fall Creek mainly on minnows, night crawlers and gulp power eggs- chartreuse best color. Roark Creek proved to be a great spot to go and get out of the current and catch rainbows too. Jig and float- use a jig head (1/32) and put an orange gulp egg on it and fish it 4 feet deep. You'll do well!