Heading out.............

[Steve Johnson]

CW, if you polled every angler who launched at one of the launch sites on Bull or Stockton and told them that if you could come back with your choice of Bass, Crappie, Catfish, White Bass, or Walleye, guaranteed, which one would you want? I guarantee you you would see a 90 % Walleye answer. Walleye are taking over in the fishing world down here.Ask walleyesrus, he'll tell you there has been a shift toward walleye alone from Bass on Bull Shoals. There aren't many Bass tournaments going out of Bull anymore like there used to be. Now, they are still going strong on Table Rock. But, in 10 years from now, I wouldn't be surprised if Table Rock doesn't have this same kind of trend as well. You watch & see.

[powerdive]

Sure, they'd like to COME BACK with a walleye--but they'd rather CATCH a bass. You go out on the lake and ask all the anglers what they're fishing for--it'll be mostly bass. It's what they know around here...what the boats are built for...what people always do with their limited time.

[Triton X2]

[walleyesrus]

Actually I think you are both wrong, I believe the #1 sought after fish on Stockton is the crappie, and it is actually the decline of the crappie fishing on Stockton that led to the increased # of walleye fishermen. When I gave my seminar at the nature center i polled the crowd on how they gained their interest in walleye fishing and about 1/2 the crowd were crappie fishermen that were catching occasional walleyes and wanted to learn how to target them specifically. The other half were transplanted northerners who wanted to learn how to catch them here. You are not going to convert a bass nut until he has rotator cuff surgery and can no longwer cast. Then if their competitive juices are still flowing they may convert to tournament walleye fishing. Frankly the pressure on walleyes that already exists concerns me so if you goofs want to chase fish with ss in their name by all means be my guest. Trust me I didn't enjoy reeling in those 3 lb white bass last weekend I only did it so i could get them off my hook so the walleye could ignore it.

[coyotewhacker]

Lee...you're probably dead on correct...the crappie fishermen just go out, do their thing, come home and eat filets for supper. Several of the guys who were posting here caught walleyes on minnows as a by product of their crappie fishing. LIke you, I don't like to fight those big ol' white bass....which is why I will be using very light line, tiny lures, and a rod with the backbone of a piece of boiled spaghetti....I fished for bass since I was eight years old...calendars had not yet been invented, but the scratch marks on the cave wall will verify that. I got indoctrinated into tournament bass fishing in 1979 in south Mississippi when B.A.S.S. was just a baby. I went walleye fishing for the first time in late January of 2004 and hooked, but did not boat, a pretty decent sow out in front of the Beaver Creek Marina. Ernie Wells and Gary Smith were close enough to see the fish on top, so I had witnesses. Two weeks later I was invited to accompany Bill Holden so he could pass on some tips on walleye fishing. On the second cast of the morning for me I felt a familiar tap-tap and set the hook on what turned out to be a very nice 9lb 4oz walleye. It was before sunup on a bank south of River Run, and maybe 40 yards after that I caught a five pounder.
I never caught another keeper all spring....but I was hooked. I can go to Stockton and most of the time have no great shakes catching (and releasing) several bass. Maybe I have an intuitive feeling for catching bass, and I know for sure that I have not even come close to developing some small level of intuitive walleye fishing ability. I can see both sides of the fence from where I sit...and I still wonder what the guy fishing for crappie thinks when three dozen boats come flying by him at top speed...I doubt if he takes the time to think "Bass" or "walleye"....in his mind it's just a bunch of testosterone overloaded yahoos going down the lake as fast as they can, and to h e l l with anybody who happens to be in their way....sorta the way we feel about jet skis, if you will. I love walleye fishing, but I don't see it displacing bass fishing as the high dollar tournament fish around here in two or three lifetimes. It seems to be clouding up over to the east....maybe we will get a rain tonight and cool things down for tomorrow's unwalleye trip. If you see the Express, wave or holler.

[walleyesrus]

I agree, the popularity of bass fishing isn't going to slow anytime soon. Walleye fishing will continue to grow but I doubt it will be fast. The crappie fishing on Stockton is going to pick up big time in the next couple years there are a ton of 8 inch fish in there now.

[Triton X2]

Guys I have crappie fished both of those lakes over the years, I dont always bass fish, and this past year down on TableRock was the best I have ever seen....It was fantastic...I fished for them for 2 solid weeks and caught I dont know how many and they were anywhere from 12 inches to around 16 to 17 inchers....I am looking forward to next spring...Maybe even hooking up with you guys to try my luck at the toothy critteris. I have fished almost every inch of bull shoals from river run to tucker hollow....but it was for those green and white fish...
I can remember back when I first started fishing we would go down on the bull and find literally acres of whites surfacing...They dont do that down there any more, but I have caught a number of them up at Stockton surfacing or in the fall fishing windy blown points with a rooster tail....

[Steve Johnson]

There is NOTHING wrong with Crappie fishing or eatng Crappie filets. They are the BEST fish for people to catch because they are EASY & FUN to catch. I agree with Lee that they are probably the most popular fish on Stockton right now, but I still say that they would rather catch a walleye than a Crappie, Largemouth or Kentucky Bass, or White Bass anyday. But, I'll take a BIG Brownie (smallmouth)just about anytime.

[meat man]

Just got home from the green carp tourney caught some but not quite long enough to weigh n. Don't feel bad though I would say 80% of the field did not weigh a fish. 1 team had a limit of 6 carp. It paid down to 8th place that was 2 fish , with around 3lb. 12.? lb won ,there were probably 45 boats in it.(only 2 LUNDS) Lots of rangers.Had fun though ,will probably do it again next week.El Presidente did u call that girl yet? Are u coming down still friday?

[coyotewhacker]

MM...are you now the "social facilitator" for El Presidente?
That's what Vernon Jordan used to do for Bill Clinton, you know. Sorry you didn't get a check, but there's always next time. That's what I keep telling myself, anyway.
I woke up about 1:15 and could not go back to sleep, so here I sit at the computer, catching up on back mail. The Express is loaded, tarped, and ready to go....yeah, have to cover it with a tarp to take it anywhere with all the dust on our fine Polk County roads. The "road improvement crew" consisting of two big graders came by day before yesterday and improved our road by bringing the subsurface dust back up to the top so that it can be re-distributed onto passing vehicles and towed boats. By the time I drive the two miles or so to the blacktop road, my Explorer will look like it hasn't been washed this year. It's sparkling clean rightnow.
Arrrrgh!

[Steve Johnson]

CW, you area TRUE fisherman in the sense that you are still " pumped up " before a fishing trip. Symptoms of this are what you said you have: restlessness before the trip, not being able to sleep, etc. The Glitter sled will do you OK I hope. I know you had a peck of trouble with it at the July tourney, and I HOPE that is all straightened out now. I am doing the same thing at my sister's, except I'm not going fishing. I just happened to get up to go to the John real quick and thought I'd wrap up any back e-mail. It's 4:13 a.m., but I will be going back to sleep here in a few minutes. Onemore thing CW, please DON"T even mention me in the same breadth as that stinking Bill Clinton. That guy was the worst President there was far as morals were considered, and he will always be remembered for that affair with his intern, Monica Lewinski, while he was in office.(He was a true chip off the old block from his president hero: John Kennedy, who did the same thing with Marilyn Monreo, only it was kept quiet until well after he was dead). I DON'T know why his wife(Hillary) doesn't have any spine and won"t dump him. He deserves this at the least, as he embarrassed her & his daughter, not to mention himself while he was in office. I guess Hillary figures it is political gain to keep her marriage(NOT) to him intact. You saw what happened to that guy(Vernon Jordan)when he saw all this unveiling don't you: He committed suicide).

Anyway, MEATMAN, I sent you an earlier post to answer your question: NO, I have NOT called that gal again yet, and I have a state Softball Tournament that I have to umpire this Saturday & Sunday, so I will have to make it down either next weekend or the weekend after this to meet her and to set up a fishing trip with you. Call me about this later this week OR this weekend(make it a LATE P.M. call--say, after 10:30 p.m.). Maybe next time you will come in the money on the Green Carp tournament. Too bad there aren't any social walleye tournaments down on that end of the lake. I wonder what ever happened to that Walleye Club that AA visited earlier this year and why they aren't more active in this kind of thing? They sounded like they have the perfect makeup for this kind of thing. Sell some real estate MeatMan.

[meat man]

CW , I guess so . I don't know why El Presidente won't call this ole gal . I guess he is scared . This girl is hot. About a size 6 ,probably 5ft 10 long dark hair and a smile that el melt ya. CW, that sounds great about the get togethers on the lake. Just let me know when!CW, about your road just get a state senator to move close to ya ,you want have to worry about that for much longer. And on the tourney last night I didn't have the right baits. They were deep and I couldn't get it down there to em. I asked before the tourn,if I could troll they said no,also told me no live bait . I said what kinda tournament is this anyway??

[powerdive]

My workplace has an annual bass tourney at Table Rock for the associates (go figger). In 7 years, I've never fished it. They were pushing me hard to get into it, until I told 'em I'd be targeting smallmouths and spots by trolling cranks on leadcore...

[coyotewhacker]

We survived the Stockton trip.....it was amazing...the temperature surrounding the lake was well into the 80's at sunup. Down on the lake it was a wonderful 65 degrees and stayed that way all morning until we left. And if you believe that.....actually it wasn't too bad with the breeze that picked up about mid-morning, but the Explorer outside temp thermometer said it was 96 degrees at eleven am.
We caught fish....not staggering numbers, and no big ones, but I opened with a nice 13" smallmouth off a point north of Mutton Creek at 6:30 or so. On that wimpy Diawa ultralight spincast, it was all I wanted for a couple of minutes.Did the Jimmy Houston thing, kissed it and put it back to fight another day. For some unexplainable reason, today was more "my" day than Billy's...we were both using very similar lures, and I was trying hard to avoid backseating him, but I caught a few more than he did...which is not the norm. I did get a walleye on the line, but was practicing the "boatside release" technique I learned down on Bull Shoals a couple of years ago....it still works. We caught a few small bbbb...green carp, but they were mostly a by product of the big bluegills that were all over our swimming minnow jigs...if it had been a bluegill outing, it would have been considered an unqualified success. I threw nothing but a little bare 1/8oz roundhead jig with a Wal Mart el cheapo "fighting minnow" on the hook shank. If I had been using the good stuff from Unwalleye Pro Shop, I might have had even more hits. Billy alternated between the jig and a baby Zara Spook. All my fish were taken close to the bank...as in within five or six feet of the bank. A big underwater rock eventually got my best jig setup on the spincast rig, so I tied the same thing on a Unwalleye Pro Shop Qualifier u/l and a Wally Marshall rod....that worked nicely. Today we were using an electric blue fighting minnow with chrome flecks...when my last one came off the jig, I put on a black little dealie that must have been some kind of tiny catfish ....maybe a sculpin. Anyway, it was not nearly as effective as the electric blue ones. Surface temp on the main lake and Sons Creek is 85.4....chances are the white bass are staying a little deeper than we were fishing.
Overall it was a good trip....the Express performed flawlessly for a change. Started right up every time, ran smoothly, and never missed a beat....hopefully that will continue.

[lunders]

Hey,C.W. thanks for the update,sounds like you folks had a good day,just no fish fry.Were there any boats out on the flats? We were there this weekend,alot of boats on the flats,just no one catching anything.Hopefully,see you at hooters on thursday evening.