Big Brown

[bkbying89]

Travis Swift, I recently observed a very large trout at Maramec Spring with a tail about two or two and a half inches or possibly wider. I think it was the tail of a trout but there are goggle eye and sunfish in the spring as well. So yes I'm sure they would be capable of taking a really large bait.

[snagged in outlet 3]

17 hours ago, Travis Swift said:

I really have been tossing around the idea of a trying a rainbow trout colored swimbait this summer.  maybe a 6 to 8 inch one, thinking the bluffs across from lilleys or even lower taney.  I have zero doubt in my mind the monster browns, say 15 pounds and over eat small rainbows.

I witnessed it at Rim Shoals on the white.

Me and Gary Flippin were coming up from the bottom of the CnR area when we saw a commotion near the bank.

We motored over and watched several large browns corralling a bunch of stocker rainbows against the bank.

Every so often one of the browns would charge in and pick off one the stockers.  When it charged in some of the rainbows were so freaked out they jumped out of the water onto the bank to get away.  Gary told me he sees that all the time after the stocking truck has been there.

Pete

 

[Mitch f]

This is my buddy Dan.

He catches big fish.

 

 

[jpb2187]

Beauts!

[Travis Swift]

there's quite a few stocker rainbows that take bait a little to deep and die and you talk about an easy quick meal for a monster sized brown.  I'm also in agreement with Phil that lower end is a tad warmer for the monster browns, it's wider, they don't have to fight the current as much plus they also have small sunfish and other small fish to eat down there as well.  I really want to throw a swimbait down there for big browns, problem is when you only get 15 or so days on that lake a year it's hard to give us a day of jig fishing to try for that 1 giant bite.  Now onto that bass comment......I've ALWAYS wondered if there were some 10 pound or bigger bass down there eating rainbows, they do it everywhere else in the country that have small rainbows why wouldn't they there?  I have a buddy that has a dock down below branson and he swears every year there are a couple 8 to 10 pound bass under his dock for a week or two a year and he's from Texas so he knows what big bass look like. 

[Phil Lilley]

Big rainbows and browns will hang under docks where fish are cleaned.  There's a good reason they're big...

Rainbows are stocked mainly below Branson, either by boat or right off a ramp.  Following this reasoning, you'd find those big browns in those areas.