So What's the Prognosis for Tomorrow the 4th?

[Bimmer]

Wife and I are planning an early launch. Is the water still cluttered? We put in at Cooper Creek and head to the trophy area. But we've had so much rain, I don't know whether it's worth the trip from Springfield or not. Any ideas what the water is like and what colors are best?

Thanks folks!

Happy & Safe 4th to All! (hope to see a few fellow vets on the water tomorrow)

[Travis Swift]

Water looks great and fish are biting. Scuplin peach, sculpin ginger and white all on 1/8th ounce jigs have done the trick for me. Tons of boat traffic so take it easy and have fun

[Bimmer]

Thanks Travis! We'll be there early for sure.

[Phil Lilley]

Didn't get on to see your question... but Travis did good in his report.

Four units of water- lots of current and yes there's lots of boat traffic. It's the 4th... and it's a Saturday. Double whammy!

Had more people tell me this week has been some of the best fishing they're ever had here on Taney. Whether throwing jigs or drifting night crawlers... lots of nice browns (more than usual) and good sized rainbows.

Hope you do well.

[Bimmer]

Thanks Phil!! We didn't get on the water until about 7:30 - 8:00. The boat traffic was extremely light, as I think the fog may have had something to do with that. We had several issues with the 2nd fuel tank, so needing to just refill the main tank, we drifted down to your place and as always your folks too great care of us! For us fishing was tough! We drift some sculpin jigs and spent so much time getting hung up, we switch to crawlers on the jigs. The water was just too heavy to just use a 1/8 jig so we used a sliding bullet weight at 3/8oz. Next time we'll go lighter. After noon and getting skunked we switched to San Juan worms and a crawler and we managed out three very nice bows for tonight's dinner.

On a side note, the fish between Lilley's and Copper Creek were incredible! They were every where. We just couldn't get them to bite. Nearly all of them were hugging the bottom at about 18ft, but there were school after school of them.

We were just going to hang it up around 3:30 about 1/4 mile upstream of Copper Creek. When I got hit hard on the San Juan worm and a crawler. I knew when he fought it definitely wasn't a bow. Made my day though. Got this pic and released him. Guess he just wanted to say hello and Happy 4th!

[Aggressor1988long]

I was there to a really tough day had one trout rip a rod out of my boat, but that's what I get for not having it in the rod holder, went up to phils and got a gold rebel and wham fish on.and the tasted good, all my trout were pink inside

[Gatorjet]

After getting settled in, and getting the Gator in the water I ran up to Lookout. Went up the slough a ways, never been back there. Just wanted to see if it was passable to float down from above. Looks like a couple pretty tight spots with downd trees across the water. Don't mind runing over them, but don't want them running over me!

Fished a sculpin/olive/olive head jig on the way back out. As soon as I got to the mouth of the slough, and into some slack water I started catching fish. Tucked the boat into still water, and continued to catch fish. Also tried a brown/orange head jig under a float. It was still rigged up with a midge trailer about a foot under the jig. First cast boated a fat 16" bow on the jig. Continued to catch some smaller fish on the midge. Went back to a straight jig, this time mottled sculpin with orange head. Boated a couple more with that.

Didn't keep accurate count, but I'd say a dozen fat, and sassy bows in a couple hours from launch to dock. Including an unsuccessful drift from Lookout to Fall Creek experimenting with a lure I wanted to try in this swift water. These were the fattest, heaviest, strongest fighting 15"-18" rainbows I've caught in Taneycomo!