O A F Winter White River Trip 2013

[Ham]

FWIW, you might plan on a 45 minute shuttle. It took me quite a while thru the ice and downpour last night. Big ole snowflakes last night (closer to morning), but I doubt there was any accumulation.

[Phil Lilley]

As reported, we put in at Rim Shoals yesterday at 9 am and floated down to the mouth of the Buffalo River and Riley's Lodge. Kyle said they were running a good amount of water and we had no issues floating over all shoals including the Buffalo Shoals which they said was the "hairiest". We did have to pick the best spots and watch for larger rocks and wood structures. A little wind mid day blowing up river and rain/snow off and on all day.

We all threw either jigs or stick baits and tried to stay in the deepest side of the river. I'm used to Taneycomo and fished deeper water so casting and working what I considered shallow water - 3-4 feet - would seem fruitless but it wasn't. There were trout holding all through these areas to my surprise.

I used mostly an 1/8th ounce jig but did throw a 3/32nd ounce every once in a while - especially when I felt like an 1/8th ounce was too big. Didn't seem to matter though.

Colors- white was the biggest producer but I did throw a sculpin/ginger and an olive/sculpin and caught fish.

Trout seemed to be holding in groups. We'd all have fish on in various stretches and then nothing for a while. But most of the time we were catching fish all the way down the river.

There was one stretch that we all were catching nothing but brown trout which was fun.

Most of the trout were on the small side- 10 to 12 inches with some 8's and 9's mixed in. I think our biggest rainbow was 14 inches and largest brown was may be 19 inches.

I'd never fished this stretch except for fishing just the Rim Shoals area a few times, once with John Berry. I was impressed how many trout were in this river although I was very surprised we didn't see more 15-inch-plus fish.

Kyle did a great job handling his big jon and Cody manned the trolling motor all day. No one fell in and everyone caught fish. I wish I could have stayed longer at the lodge but was scared of the icy roads, especially the road getting out of the river valley but to my surprise all the ice had melted off from morning to evening yesterday. No problems at all getting home.

Looking forward to the next OAF fishing trip.

[fishinwrench]

Awesome fellas! Way to go !

[Mitch f]

Looks like they are having a blast!!

[LittleRedFisherman]

Another GReat Day, Report To Come!

[Guest]

I am jealous. Looks like a blast.

[Phil Lilley]

Wind... I see the wind.

 

 

Here's the only video I shot yesterday.

[gotmuddy]

we had a great day today. Today the lineup was Terrierman and me in Ham's boat, LRF, Quillback in Hoglaws boat. Despite the weather we had great day of fishing going from Buffalo City to Norfork. In our boat we caught nearly 150, the biggest being this brown I caught on a brown/orange zigjig. The other boat caught nearly as many, after brett gets done cooking he can post an update.

[LittleRedFisherman]

To follow up on GotMuddys post thought i'd show some pics from the day, and it was another great day! Today I fished with Hoglaw and Quillback as we floated from Rileys Station to Norfork. We got on them quick, and Quillback got going strong early, he had this jig fishing down right off the bat! He was nailing them with a red and black zig jig. Hoglaw and I were on them as well using different color jigs. I pretty much stayed with the olive and ginger that was hot yesterday. Wasn't long before Hoglaw caught a nice brown. Today the fish ran a little smaller early on, but later in the day we caught nicer fish.

As the day wore one, Hoglaw talked us into floating some water below the Norfork confluence down to Steamboat. That was a good move, our best action of the day for the Browns. We had about a 50 percent ratio of Rainbows and Browns down there, and caught some nice fish. Hoglaw did great job putting us on the fish in his big Riverboat.

Now we just finished eating some fish I cooked outside, some Flathead I caught out of the St. Francis a while back. What a great time we have had, this has to be an annual event now!! Some of us are leaving in the morning, but Hoglaw and Muddy are going to try to catch an early morning scheduled generation on the Norfork, so wish I could make it for that one! Great time, great folks, great fishing!! What a trip. Today we caught somewhere between 250 and 300 trout between six guys and two boats. Ham "The Jig Master" caught 78 on his own, a fishing machine!!

Thanks to Phil for running such an awesome fishing site for things like this to happen!

[Phil Lilley]

How was the smoked salmon?