Fished with Brent Frazee yesterday

[Phil Lilley]

Over the years, Brent Frazee has been a friend to all outdoor lovers, writing mainly for the esteemed paper, the Kansas City Star.  He's a great writer, a superb angler but even more, he's a good person and fun to be around.

His retirement from the Star hasn't dampened his enthusiasm for the outdoors in the least.  He is still writing, now at his pace. 

Brent drove down from his home in Park Hill, Missouri Tuesday and the plan was to go fishing Wednesday morning.  But rain was in the forecast so we went to Clockers for some breakfast.

Getting back to the resort, and still no rain, we decided to brave it and go.  The radar showed rain from the SW coming but nothing hard.  I boated to Short Creek and started there thinking we could duck in to a dock if it started.  It didn't.  And the fish weren't interested there.

We boated on up to Fall Creek.  We threw 1/16th and 3/32nd oz jigs at them in dark colors - sculpin, black, brown.  They still weren't loving us too much, then the rain started.  

We sought shelter under one of the docks for a short time, then went back out, this time boating up past the Narrows.  We tried jigs, them drifting a scud but still not much of anything.

Another short rain and sitting under Fall Creek Marina's dock, then seeing the end of the weather, we boated to the dam.

Again, throwing jigs, we started connecting to some rainbows.  Brent was the first to hook and land a nice rainbow, about 18 inches.  He wanted some photos for the article he was writing so that was our picture fish.  After that, he said, "the pressure was off".  But it wasn't the only 18-incher we caught.

The wind picked up after the rain stopped, blowing up the lake.  We had to go with a heavier jig, trying to start connected to the jig and the bite.  Black/olive and black/gray was our best colors.  I did try a white jig towards the end of the trip and caught a couple of rainbows.

All in all, we caught about 18 rainbows and Brent did catch one smallmouth bass on a sculpin/ginger jig down just past the MDC boat ramp.

Water temperature is 58 degrees and stained.  They've been running the same water for a week straight now -- anywhere from a half unit to a full one, day and night.  This is actually a good thing seeing the only oxygen our lake is getting is from generation and from the hatchery outlets.

There's a weather change starting next week, with colder days and nights.  This will help Table Rock turn over and hopefully we'll see a reprieve in our low oxygen fall event.

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[Smithvillesteve]

That is one beautiful fish!! and i miss Mr Frazee writing for the KC Star!!

[fishinwrench]

Brent is a really good guy, I played guide for him and my old buddy Jim Karr many years ago.   I still recall all the old "Hammer and Sickle" jokes that we're flying around that weekend between them.  Those two were some heavy debaters but it always remained classy and good natured.

 

[Born to Fish]

And the "curse" of the outdoor writer!!  I miss his stories in the Kansas City Star!

 

[fshndoug]

I took Brent night fishing on Lake Jacomo once in Blue Springs Mo.We had a great time.I quit taking the paper when he retired.He is a class guy

 

[Phil Lilley]

I've heard more people say that... that they've quit taking the KC Star because of their decisions regarding the outdoors, cutting Brent.

We had gotten a notice that they weren't going to print the fishing reports after January 1... then yesterday we got another email saying they've reconsidered and are not going to cut reports.  I guess they got told not to... by readers?  Probably.