Video fishing report, 1-1-16

[Phil Lilley]

 

[Phil Lilley]

The new year came in with a bang this year, not the bang of fireworks or of a big winter snow storm.  No, we've had unseasonably warm weather all winter so far --  but a little rainy.  Just a little bit.  We're talking 10 inches of rain in less than two days.  Flood rain.

Our water is high right now, but it could be be oh so much worse.  The U.S. Corps of Army Engineers will run 20,000 cubic feet per second of water through Table Rock Dam for the next several weeks, according to the last email we received.  The Corps wants to get Table Rock Lake down to 920 feet, which will take time.  Taneycomo's level is at 713.34 feet, about  two feet higher than if all four units were running.  We're getting about one-thrid from the flood gates and two-thirds from Table Rock's turbines.  Table Rock's gates are open six inches wide.

Earlier this week, when Table Rock's Dam was open 5.5 feet, a lot of thread-finned shad floated into our lake and our trout feasted on them.  We had shad floating past our place, something we haven't seen in many years.  We also witnessed clouds of freshwater shrimp along the bank as Taneycomo dropped on Wednesday and Thursday.  Friday morning there was a thick gray cloud of scuds at our boat ramp five feet long.  Dozens of trout were lining up for a shot at them.

We caught trout off our wall, our back office deck and from the window of our house during the high water.  All were bright and fat fish.  They always eat well during high water and this year-end  flood was no exception.

Fishing for these trout takes a boat right now, unless you can find slack water that's accessible from the bank.  The water is too fast and deep to do well off a dock right now, but several anglers have been catching them from our bank.

Out in a boat, whatever you use, you need to get down close to the bottom where the fish are holding up.  They are also going to hug the banks, out of the fast current, looking for food flowing by to ambush.

White jigs, spoons, spinners, shad flies and small crank baits are going to work for several weeks from the dam all the way down to Branson Landing because all these fish have been seeing shad.  Drifting night crawlers and minnows will also work because of the shad and worms that washed in to the lake during the flood.

[Jas Long]

Phil I'm coming down Tuesday morning hope to see you. 

[aarchdale@coresleep.com]

How is the drive up to the dam from fall creek after the flood? Anything new to watch for? And is staying in the middle a pretty safe bet

[Phil Lilley]

The water hasn't been down to see what's new.  Hopefully there's some trees that are gone.  About 8 docks are either damaged totally or just gone this time.  May be more.  Fall Creek is ok.  All the banks help up well.  Bottom of the Narrows and a little further down on the east side is interesting.  Lost a lot of bank there and there's some big trees along the bank in the water.  There is a tree mid channel at the bottom of the Narrows too that may make boating up with no generation interesting.