12/17/25 Eagle Rock.

[Bill Babler]

Mid December White River fishing report

Had just a super morning out of Eagle Rock. Fished up to the Arkansas line and then back down stream to the mouth of Rock Creek. 

27 bass, all LM and almost all on A-rig. 

They are not that deep up there, most all are under 23’. They are on the roll offs right where the flats dump into the channel. If there is structure that’s a positive. 

At times you will be in the middle of the lake, but only in 15’ to 25’ of water. 

Surface temp 48/49 degrees and just flat out very, very few shad. 

Fished a spot I really like in a creek, and caught 5 nice crappie in about 30 minutes. There were schools of them suspended in 12’ to 15’ of water.   Could have caught a limit but I don’t freeze fish. 5 for Becky and I are really to many as she has a one skillet rule. 

Beautiful 65 degree December day with no wind.





 

[Dewayne French]

Thanks Mr. Bill love to hear your reports they keep me updated on the bite and that Eagle rock is one of my favorite areas of the lake much appreciated.  

[slabseeker]

18 hours ago, Bill Babler said:

Could have caught a limit but I don’t freeze fish.

Kudos. Nice to hear these days.  It is interesting to hear how often fish are suspended in open water.  Water looks nice & calm too. Thanks for sharing. 

[rps]

Several of those picture tell me where you were, but your secret is safe. I may be wrong, but now that you are retired, it seems you fish up river more often.

[Bill Babler]

Since we now live at Shell Knob I do fish from Baxter up the river to Arkansas more. 

Living at the dam for 20 years and guiding down there kept me on the lower end of the lake. 

I started my guide business out of SK many moons ago so there has always be a place in my heart for the upper end. 

I have always however fished the Eagle Rock area in Winter and early Spring. 

Very seldom do you catch a fish with a hook hole in his mouth above Roaring River.  Out of Baxter I’ve had days that 90% of the fish I’ve caught had previously been caught and released. 

I really like the solitude up there.  There was just Tom and I at the ramp at Eagle Rock and one small aluminum boat. 

On a completely BRIGHT NOTE, I found a roll off I had never fished covered with another stump row with some nice LM on it. Not huge yesterday but nice fun 16” to 18” fish. 

From Owl Creek up past Beaver Town  and that’s a lot of water, there are stump and fence rows right along the channel in lots of locations and regardless of time of year they always hold fish. At times not friendly fish but other times hungry fish. 

I have put way to many hours on my motors over the years looking for and at these areas, with 2D and side scan. 

I know I don’t have as many as Randy, but I’ve got 10/15 plus solid offshore stump rows and then added a dandy yesterday.
 Here is the kicker, I found it at 50 mph on the Garmin 2D. The Garmin  with the GT8 records  bottom in amazing clarity at high speed. 

I’ve been over that spot 100’s of times but for some reason it just popped up as I was blasting along.  I hit a waypoint, slammed on the brakes and went back. 
Probably a 50 yard stretch, 22’ that plunged into 50’ covered with stumps all in a row  

They bit decent there, had 4 keepers but there were several dozen fish on the location. 

In the famous words of Arnold S.  “I’ll be back”. 










 

[Bill Babler]

SlabSeeker, 

I heard Mike Baker say he thought only 10% of crappie on a body of water related to structure. 
I’m not that proficient on specks to know, but this time of year on the Rock they seem to roam in large schools in open water. 

Up the James in the Peach Orchard area clear to the Flat creek bridge there are and will be in the next couple of months school after school in open water. 

Up the White in the creeks they are also roaming.  

I know Mike catches them in open water on Lake O. And Truman. I have also seen them on Stockton, or below any of our dams. 


 

[slabseeker]

Good information Bill.  I can definitely see where that might be the case. In my experience we pretty well have just fished structure that we knew. Sometimes we catch em sometimes we don't. I've never been one for trolling or fishing open water much but can see where that might be something to consider.

[Bill Babler]

Unfortunately, side scan and LiveScope opened this up. Used to see it on 2D but mostly just thought they were Gizzard Shad. 

LiveScope you can tell exactly what you’re looking at and  follow them.  Really hard for schools of fish to hide. 
Whole new world. 
Kind of like shooting docks totally changed everything.  

Watch some of Mike Baker’s videos trolling open water on both Lake  O. and Truman.  You can also watch his videos of Scoping open water this time of year. 
I know he shot one fishing Proctor Creek on Lake of the Ozarks that is full of information. He didn’t say the creek, but up the river and I knew the location immediately. He just whaled the tar out of huge Winter crappie that were just suspended over nothing. 
Baker’s crappie videos are the absolute best. 
He is also a catfish rod and reel hammer.