What a few days. Thank god we left early and went to Branson. We lost power around 1pm Tuesday and by 4pm we were on our way to Branson to stay with family. Some people probably weren’t fortunate enough to get out in time. With so many power lines down, I’m sure people couldn't drive on the roads that evening. From what I understand, it got real bad that evening, and got bad fast.
Today we went back down to grab a few more things and see what damage was done. I decided to take a back road that I thought would have a lot of things to see, and I wasn’t disappointed. I haven’t seen a ice storm of this magnitude ever. We actually ran over 16 power lines from Omaha to Flippin on hwy 14. I can only imagine how much more damage was done in other areas. They’re saying it could take up to three weeks to get power back on, but I think it will be on in a few days. Let’s cross our fingers and pray for the victims, along with all the workers that are risking their lives.
January 24th 2009
State Park - Gaston’s - Crowded, but fishing was still great!!
I spent about three hours on the water today. It was a good float from the State Park to Gaston’s. I saw a few big browns, but the water was low so by the time you saw them, they saw you and were out. I can’t believe we caught any browns. Both were caught by the “sneak approach” technique. One thing I’ve notice on the brown’s is they all seem to have some sort of turquoise color around the cheek plate, which is rare to me. I haven’t seen that before or maybe I haven’t noticed. All in all, waters low, fish are every where and I think its here for few more weeks.
January 23rd 2009 Rim - Buffalo Shoals - Low Water Float
I keep saying this, ANOTHER great day of fishing. The water is low and the fish are biting!!!
I’ll start by saying Rim to Buffalo Shoals is the “scenic” float. If you’re up for a long day, this is the stretch to float. There’s a few dead spots that take some rowing, but it’s loaded with shoals and deep pockets that hold tons of fish. The river has changed somewhat, but it’s easy to navigate through if you know what you’re doing. I wouldn’t attempt it with a motor boat unless you’ve done it before. Great midge water for the most part, but I could see where streamers would work if the conditions are right for it.
However, there are some likes and dislikes about this particular stretch. The good thing about this area is it’s very majestic and you really do feel like it’s you and the river. There are a few hot spots that you’ll find people fishing, but you will have a lot of water to yourself. We actually saw deer feeding along the bank, (in the middle of the day) eagles flying above like they had no care in the world. The eagle flew in the air above us for fifteen minutes before flying away. It made for some great pictures, which reminds me, you definitely need to bring a camera with you on this float.
The dislikes about this river is the fish do not hold like they do up top. I’m sure someone would argue with this statement, but from what I saw, there’s a lot of dead time where you see no fish. I guess that’s good in a way if you’re about taking breaks. But if you’re into catching fish consistently it’s upstream. From the dam to Rim Shoals is what I think is the always “prime” fishing year round. Not only that, big browns seem to hold better in the colder water. In the summer you’ll actually see the trout migrate up river when the water temperature warms up downstream about 40 miles from the dam. So the first 35 miles is what I would consider the trout water. The river is also a lot wider which creates slower water so row, row, row your boat gently down the stream has some truth to it.
John and I started the day forgetting the camera. The story will make since once you read the rest of it. Summer’s been the shuttle here lately so asking her to go all the way back home to get the camera really wasn’t on her list of things to do today. Bless her heart, she went back and got it for me and I’m glad she did. About 15-20 minutes into our day I hooked into a brown just upstream from the public boat ramp about 100 yards or so. When I hooked it I knew I didn’t have the camera so I called Summer while playing this fish to ask her where she was. As we were floating downstream I could here a car coming. Hoping it was her, and it was, I was thinking…the timing couldn’t have been any better. This fish fought hard and allowed me to land her right where the boat ramp was. What’s the odds of that happening.
The rest of the day went by with more fishing and hooking a few more smaller browns. We saw a few more bigger fish, but nothing like upstream. I’m thinking most of the bigger rainbows and browns are at the dam. We caught a lot of rainbows, but most were in the 12-15 inch range. Midge fish is what I call them because they’re eager to hit a lot of various midge patterns. I’m after bigger fish so I’m staying up river. Matter of fact…I think I’ll go fishing now. Come on browns, where are you?
Well….I got to do a little fishing at Taneycomo, but it wasn’t to great, and that had to do with running water. I didn’t bring my boat so I was relying on low water myself. It’s just weird the way they are generating. During the week, the water will be off for the most part, and on weekends they’ll run it steady. The lakes are all down below power pool so sooner or later we’ll have to have low water. And when it does I think we will have gaps of low water.
I caught some fish at Taney, but only fishing along the banks didn’t produce what I thought. I didn’t see any big fish hanging around there either. I usually do, but like I said, only during the brown run will you see multiples of big fish. It seems like more and more I’m down here I really don’t look forward to fishing Taneycomo. With saying that, I’ll still fish Taney because I do know what it’s capable of producing. Here on the White, it’s been steady action with a lot of browns throughout the river. And most days you have a good chance at catching one. That’s a great feeling. The more I’m out there learning these rivers, the more I understand the dynamics of how this “whole thing works“. If you haven’t experienced Arkansas' tailwaters, I would highly recommend you fishing it. Definitely put it on your list of places to fish. To read my latest report go to my new site. It’s getting updated a lot more than this one.
January 16th 2009
Taneycomo
Well, don’t forget about the tying clinic tomorrow. If you don’t have anything to do make sure you drop by. We will continue where we left off last month. See you at 2pm!!
Fishing report
Taneycomo is fishing extremely well. I didn’t fish too long because it was COLD. I did notice real fast that the fish are thriving and eating midges by the abundance. Also chasing streamers, which tells me the D.O. levels are up.
I decided to fish downstream in some areas I haven’t hit in awhile. I actually wanted to throw soft hackles because I haven’t fished them on Taney for some time now. I saw the trout sipping like crazy and couldn’t resist this bite. It’s always fun feeling that strike and sometimes hitting so hard you feel like the rod would get yanked out of your hand if you weren’t paying attention. The best color was black followed up with primrose and pearl style soft hackle. I tried red, but didn’t get too many takes on that one. Which bums me out because that usually fools the bigger browns. Oh well, great to be on my home waters for a change.
I plan on fishing before the clinic in the morning so I’ll let you know how I do.
January 3rd 2009
WHAT'S NEW??
As you can tell, I have revised the site a little bit. I will be more focused on my new site related to Arkansas tailwaters (White River & Norfork). Since I'm in the Arkansas area more than Branson now, I will be doing work on the new site more than the Taneycomo site. I'm sure everyday you'll see new things added. The site is called
http://www.whiteriverandnorforktrout.com . There is also a clickable link at the top where all the links are...it’s called "my other site". A few things I did was delete the fly pattern pages (warmwater) because there is alot more to look through on the new site. They are subtitled pages from the fly tyer's blog ( fly patterns nymph, dries, wets, streamers, warmwater and saltwater). I think you will find about everything you need for patterns devoted for Ozark waters, plus alot more traditional patterns you can fish else where. They are not "how-to-steps", just alot of patterns you can click to enlarge to see the fly in a more detailed format. This will allow you to look more in depth if you're trying to tie the pattern. Eventually some of them will turn into how-to-steps, but I want to focus more on talking about each pattern, then have a clickable link to learning how to tie it. You can see how the format will be done on the tying page ( called site updates) over on the new site. I have one up right now, but there will be many more to come as the winter continues. This page was built to keep you updated on what pages will always have things going on. Just click on the pictures and you'll go right to the pages. Right now, I'm not posting alot of reports so I can finish trying to get the bulk work done on the site. Another part that I finally finished for the most part is putting fishing videos online. If it’s related to Taney, it’s on the Taneycomo site, etc. There are some I found on both that were never hosted so you can go check those out too. Although I haven’t been writing reports, I have been fishing a handful of times. I’m not doing much in the way of posting reports unless it’s really something worth talking about, like catching something big or a really cool story. I hope that doesn’t come across in a bad way, it’s really because I’m so focused on getting this site done in the winter.
The water conditions have been fair. From fishing extremely high water last year to fishing 3-4 units on the White I guess it isn’t too bad. There’s been a lot more low water on the Norfork. Sometimes you’ll have to fish a few hours of high water and then they’ll shut it off. I’ve been hooking a number of fish with most being rainbows between 10-16 inches. On the White we’ve been hooking several on streamers. Yellow/olive seems to be the best with black to follow. The Norfork isn’t fishing all that well with bigger fish, but the numbers are there. I have also noticed if a few days go by where they’re not generating the fish will go back into the White. The key is to hit right after they are generating and then shut it off. That seems to be when I catch something in the 20-inch class. Still not seeing huge fish at the Fork, but I’m sure we will this year. I’m just glad the 2008 flood year we had is over and I’m sure we all look forward to the new year!! I hope everyone enjoys the new site and I look forward to throwing more content on as the year goes on. I’m sure you’ll see some informational stuff as I figure out more about this interesting fishery. I can tell you this: a lot more goes on with entomology and figuring out the different water scenarios then at Taneycomo. They're both unique in their own way. I miss Taney and I wish I could give you more reports. Make sure you check because when I do I’m going to post them here and not on the White River & Norfork site. Best fishes…