Lilley's Lake Taneycomo Fishing Report, March 1

[Travis Swift]

I guess in a nutshell from my opinion is I feel like MDC has done an excellent job of trying to take angler input into account and have created and maintained a wonderful fishery for anyone and everyone.  They will do what they have always done I'm sure and that is tweak things here and there but there is no doubt they are always trying to make a great fishery that has a mix of sizes of fish and opportunities from catching numbers to potential world records.  I applaud them for their work, we are all excellent arm chair biologist no doubt  

[Ryan Miloshewski]

6 minutes ago, Travis Swift said:

I guess in a nutshell from my opinion is I feel like MDC has done an excellent job of trying to take angler input into account and have created and maintained a wonderful fishery for anyone and everyone.  They will do what they have always done I'm sure and that is tweak things here and there but there is no doubt they are always trying to make a great fishery that has a mix of sizes of fish and opportunities from catching numbers to potential world records.  I applaud them for their work, we are all excellent arm chair biologist no doubt  

Hey, I'm an actual biologist (by degree) lol. I still keep up with carrying capacity and population dynamic publications. Huge nerd, I know. Stuff is interesting and keeps you informed though!

[Phil Lilley]

April, 2020, we closed.  We got some work done but mostly we gave our staff a break and they enjoyed some paid vacation.  But most of us fished... a lot.  We had Taney to ourselves.  We went up to Table Rock and it too was vacant of boaters.  I made a trip to Truman though and it was packed with crappie fishermen.

May was slow but towards the end we started to see normal traffic.  Mid June we saw the beginnings of a record boat rental season.  But vast majority of the new boaters were recreational.  They were spillovers from Table Rock.  No rentals available up there.  Some of them rented rods just for the fun of it and they caught a few rainbows.  But their impact on the fishery was minimal. 

Fall and winter were normal pretty much.  But spring time, 2021 we saw an influx of spring breakers and the crowds didn't stop till October.  I'd say there was an increase in lake traffic by 15%+ in the summer season but again a lot of this increase was just boaters, not anglers.

Our fishing license sales -

2016 - 84k

2017 - 76k

2018 - 80k

2019 - 67k

2020 - 81k

2021 - 86k

You have to take in consideration the increased usages of MDC apps, bypassing buying licenses at the store.

So far this winter's traffic has been average at best. 

 

[Travis Swift]

I stand corrected and will stand down.  Just seems to be a ton of traffic on the lake compared to alot of years but that was just my observation. 

[Ryan Miloshewski]

@Phil Lilley remember that day in 2020 where Steve Dickey and I landed four fish over 20? And we lost 4 others. Insanity! And nobody there to enjoy it.

[fshndoug]

If the Corp would manage Table Rock as a flood control lake instead of leaving the lake level at 915 feet they might not get caught with their pants down when Table Rock came up to almost historic heights several springs in a row. They are absolutely responsible for the devastation they caused below Table rock Dam with the erosion of the banks. They will never manage the lake as it was designed for as that will rub a lot of powerful people the wrong way. It is purely for recreational  purposes now and in the future and drawing it down 20 feet in the winter time will never happen. I will bet anything you want to match that you will see another year where there will be 100,000 cubic feet of water being released again by the Corp to prevent the topping of the dam by a flood. All one has to do is look at the overflow gates they spent $60 million dollars on because their runoff models were shown to be outdated because of climate change and the development growth with more runoff because water doesn't go through asphalt real well. By the way what are the actual decrease in stocking numbers for the last 4 years.

[Seth]

10 hours ago, snagged in outlet 3 said:

Probably wasn't go far after a trip to the parking lot anyway...  He coulda ate it though I guess.

Parking lot? I wonder if this is the 6 pounder my buddy said he watched get hauled from the parking lot down to the water after the boat was trailered last Saturday…….

[snagged in outlet 3]

35 minutes ago, Seth said:

Parking lot? I wonder if this is the 6 pounder my buddy said he watched get hauled from the parking lot down to the water after the boat was trailered last Saturday…….

His picture of weighing it is in a boat on a trailer in a parking lot.  So maybe it was.  

[snagged in outlet 3]

37 minutes ago, Seth said:

Parking lot? I wonder if this is the 6 pounder my buddy said he watched get hauled from the parking lot down to the water after the boat was trailered last Saturday…….

The picture is gone now.  

[Seth]

1 hour ago, snagged in outlet 3 said:

His picture of weighing it is in a boat on a trailer in a parking lot.  So maybe it was.  

Oof. Yea I heard that didn’t go so smoothly. Sounds like the fish took a bit of a beating in the process……