Long Creek

[DeeWilly]

I am new to the forum and used the site to prepare myself for a trip to Table Rock this past weekend April 27-30. Although I have fished the lake for several years and have done fairly well the posts here helped to jog my memory on some forgotten techniques. I would like to thank all that have provided information and special thanks to Bill Babler for the fishing maps. Although I didn't fish that part of the lake that Bill mapped I was going to use that as my backup plan if things didn't work out on the Long Creek portion of the lake. I have chartered with Bill in the past and I encourage anyone looking to learn about the lake and just flat catch fish give him a try.

Now, to the important stuff. As many of you know the weather in MO this weekend was trash: wind, rain, and thunderstorms. However, despite the weather I was able to put together a working pattern. The most effective was a watermelon seed centipede rigged carolina style and fished on the main lake pionts in the Long Creek portion of the lake. I also caught fish on top water along the wooded bluffs near channel swings early in the mornings. The rouge also worked but not very consistent along the same bluffs but, very close to the bank. In all I would say I caught about 30 bass in two days including smallies, spots, and bucket mouths most of which were between 10 to 15 in. The largest was a 18 in. spot that I am guessing weighted about 4 lbs. and is attached below. Well, I wouldn't have won any tournaments but, I had a blast. All fish were released unharmed. Best of luck to all and keep those lines tight.

[LWW]

Nice Spot! Sounds like you nailed 'em on a good pattern. That's a little more than I could say for me and my fishing crew this weekend. Between (3) of us, we boated about 25-30 fish. Mostly one fisherman, he was on fire with a 1/4oz jig head and watermelon candy zoom finesse worm. We fished every where from Baxter's to Big "M" Marina. Looking back at both days and considering the weather, we boated some fish, but nothing of real size and a slow bite at each spot. I was really surprised the Topwater bite was non-existent(at least around Shell Knob) considering all the cloud cover we had most the weekend.

Glad you had a nice trip Dee Willy. Thanks for the pic!

LWW