Lilleys' Lake Taneycomo Fishing Report, December 29

[Phil Lilley]

This should be my last fishing report of 2013 unless I somehow have an awesome day of fishing tomorrow or Tuesday! That could happen I guess. But this year's fishing here on Taneycomo has been a good one. No floods --  always a good thing.

Generation has picked up since a rain a couple of weeks ago, plus some snow, brought the lakes above us up more than a foot.  Anywhere from two to three units are running most days, all day and all night long, even with the warmer temperatures.  The water temperature coming from Table Rock into our lake is close to 49 degrees, which is pretty normal for this time of year.  With heavy flow we could see shad being pulled in from Table Rock, especially seeing Table Rock's water temperature is close to 40 degrees.  That's the magic number we need to see to have threadfin shad start to die on the big lake.

The lake was busy with boats and anglers this past weekend, and most of the fisher people I spoke to were catching good numbers of trout.

I took Marsha, my son Caleb and his wife, Maggie, out fishing Friday afternoon.  Two units were running with a lake level about 706 and dropping.  We drifted from just above Short Creek to Trout Hollow.  They didn't have any trouble catching their limits of nice rainbows, fishing with white and yellow PowerBait Gulp Eggs.  Catching was consistently good all the way down to the bridges, drifting bait and throwing a variety of lures including Cleos, jigs and Trout Magnets.

Saturday morning I took Jimmy, one of our sons-in-law, his two younger brothers and his nephew out fishing from about 11 a.m. until 2 p.m..  We boated to the dam and started drifting from there, with a little more than two units running with water level at 707 feet.  Guide Rick Lisek said he had done well fishing a jig and float, using 1/32nd -ounce marabou jigs, brown with orange heads, under a float 5-to 6-feet deep.  That's what I tied on for them and they did well.  John, the youngest, caught his first trout ever.  He ended the three-hour trip with 10 rainbows.

I boated to the dam today at 3 p.m.  Again, a little more than two units were running with a lake level at 707 feet.  I tied on an 1/8th-ounce sculpin jig, olive head, and straight- lined fished from the cable to Lookout Island.  When I drifted in front of the Missouri Department of Conservation boat ramp, I boated my 16th rainbow.  They were no really large ones,  maybe 13 inches was the biggest.  I caught two more rainbows before heading back up.  That was at 4 p.m.

At the cable, I tied on a white 1/8th-ounce jig . . . nothing.  Sculpin/ginger jig . . . nothing.  Brown/orange jig . . . nothing.  Then back to the same sculpin jig . . . still nothing!!  What in the world!?!?  It was like a switch was thrown at 4 p.m.  There was mp change in wind, no change in water level.  At 4 p.m. dinner was over and that was it!





I thought I'd switch colors and find something the bigger trout would like but that sure didn't work out!!

I went down and drifted the bluff below Lookout and lost three jigs.  That called the evening with no fresh fish pics!

Taneycomo continues to both amaze and confuse me.  After 30 years you'd think I'd be used to her temperament.  I'm not.

There are a lot of rainbows in the lake right now.  There are big trout, too, but they seem very elusive.  Right time, right lure I'd say.  Talked to a couple of guys yesterday who "slayed" them on brown jigs, several decent browns in the 16-inch range and one fish they "couldn't get off the bottom."  Others said they caught lots of rainbows on a variety of Powerbait products.  That's not surprising.

 

[hknfsh]

Good report Phil. Coming back on Saturday with my dad...weather permitting. Hope they bite as well as they did for me this last Saturday !