Good Fly Fishing Areas - Below Trophy Area

[troutchaser]

True, Thom.

I guess I can keep them. I've never done it before on Taneycomo. I'm a catch & release proponent, but I guess that really doesn't need to apply to stocked fish. I know I'm hungry for trout, so I'll be down there this weekend. I may even take my 12 year-old son. That would be 8 trout. What a feast!

[Lincoln]

As was mentioned earlier, I have heard that MDC would prefer that more fish were harvested outside the slot. That's part of the point of having the slot to begin with. To the best of my understanding, Taney is managed as a put-and-take fishery. C&R is great, and I do it myself most of the time, but there is absolutely nothing wrong with taking a limit of legal fish below the dam.

[WebFreeman]

I think some of the folks on this forum read it to find some technicallity to comment on every post.

Whattssup up folks. This is for fun and information not nit picking. I really don't think most of the rules were put in place to try to trick someone into getting fined.

I'm definately in this for the fun. I spend more time fishing w/ powerbait w/ my 5-year-old (1 orange, 1 yellow is my fav.) than my fly rod (which now only gets cast in the yard), so I've got NO qualms about keeping trout. But having a stringer full of illegal fish and getting caught because you thought it was ok would ruin anyone's trip. It's very good to know the lower end is loose, but that still makes me nervous. A cranking warden could still write a hefty ticket

As far as keeping below the slot, that's what the slot is for. If we don't keep some fish from up there, it messes up the management plan. Otherwise, they would have just set a 20" limit. Someone needs to start keeping fish.

[MoCarp]

if a 11 1/2 inch rainbow trout is released, how big will it be in say 6 months?

[RSBreth]

The sub-12" fish are there for people to keep, for beginers and tourists, and to feed the state record brown I should be catching here in a couple of months.

A couple of 10-11 inchers smoked and served on toast sound really good about now.

[troutchaser]

Excellent point about the slot limit, WebFreeman. The reason for setting a slot limit instead of just a 20" length limit would be so people would keep some of the smaller ones.

As was mentioned earlier, I did buy a trout tag for a reason. I'll be keeping a few more trout this year, me thinks.

I'm off to the Recipes Section!

[WebFreeman]

I saw a recipe once that involved stuffing the cavilty w/ stove top stuffing. Anyone ever try that?

[Danoinark]

if a 11 1/2 inch rainbow trout is released, how big will it be in say 6 months?

I read that at the Norfork Hatchery it takes 22 months for an egg to grow to 11 inches. The growth rate in the stream would be dependant on many factors, I think foodstuffs and the amount of nutrients in the water. I would suspect on Taney the growth rate would be fast because of the "good" nutrients constantly being produced from the outlets outflow.....Dano

[Rick F]

When I fished down there a few years back and had my ID checked by the game warden I inquired about the possesion limit. He told me that I can have the possesion limit at the resort I was staying at including what was in the live well and that was it. At the time it was 10 (5 in the freezer and 5 in the boat) Now, I traveled from Indiana and was staying a lilley's so it was a temporary residence. I agree with the previous post that if you take them home then you should be alright, just don't stash them in a freezer in your motor home or cooler. The warden did tell me if I wanted to keep more then all I have to do is eat the ones I got. No problem.

[Thom]

One of the ways that we prepare trout is to stuff them with a dressing made just the same way that turkey or chicken dressing is make.

Make the dressing just as the corn bread stuffing package says adding sauteed onions, celery, carrots, mushrooms and wetting with one egg an chicken broth. If you really want to splurge (and it is worth it) get a small amount of cocktail shrimp and crabmeat and add it to the dressing.

salt and pepper the cavity and stuff the dressing into the fish. You can also just wrap filets around the dressing for the same result. Any dressing left over can be baked on the side.

Lay a strip of bacon on top of the fish and put in a charcoal grill on foil or bake in an oven at 350 degrees until the meat is just flaky.