Fishing in the Ozarks (MO/AR/OK/IL/KS) all 12 months! even winter! what is working, what is not working, new ideas and photo's of great fishing experiences. Kayak Angling is spoken here with a heavy emphasis on Kayak Fishing and paddling!
Got the Feelfree Moken Fishing kayak out for the first time this year up at Lake Sherwood in Warren County, MO. This lake is really known for it's panfish (killer sized Redears and bluegills). I did not know if it was too early yet or not. I went out the week before for a few hours without much success. Caught a couple of nice sized bluegill towards the dam, but was not able to put together a stringer. My brother in law and nephew did really well out by the marina.
The temperature towards 4 p.m was around 67 degrees surface, so the rest of the water should be changing real soon if the temps keep staying in the 70's and 80's....should be an early spawn this year!
I am thinking I will have some better success stories in upcoming posts real soon
I put the kayak in at the Greenville area (run by Corps of Engineers). This is the point where the St. Francis River starts to turn into Lake Wappapello. I decided to paddle up stream on the St. Francis River side. The weather was interesting. It started at about 80 degrees and sunny. As I set out to paddle, it started to get real windy. By the end of the trip, it was cloudy, cool, and I ended up putting on the sweater I had packed earlier. I am really glad I brought it. The high cirrus clouds looked like they were moving about 80 mph. It was a cold front moving in for sure.
I really thought there would be a shot at some smallmouths, but they were quite. I did catch a fairly nice sized Largemouth Bass on my standard- texas rigged Zoom trick worm. I only caught one, but the fight was excellent with this guy.
It is interesting the difference in the experience kayaking in regards to comparing a SOT fishing kayak vs. a sea kayak. I really enjoy fishing off of both, and can see now why both are excellent. Soon I will probably be moving back to the sea kayak with the temperatures getting cold. My intent is to kayak all year, including the winter time. I know that I can navigate the SOT with a pair of waders and a rain jacket, but my hopes are to get a Kokatak wet suit this year. The cold weather should not stop us from getting up on the water.
Lake Atkins is located in central Arkansas between Little Rock and Ft. Smith. I brought my SOT fishing kayak, "The Bossy Flossy" along for the trip. I was able to get a couple of hours of fishing in before the sun started to go down (I figured the fishing would turn on towards sunset). I paddled across the lake and drifted along shore. This lake is chock-full of trees, stumps and structure. I had read that it was drained in 2002 and restocked with Florida-strain Largemouth bass.
It is a nice sized lake, and looks like one that does not receive as much pressure due to the stumps and the location.
I was throwing a lot of stuff out trying to get something to hit. I have not had a lot of success the last couple of trips, so I was really hoping to catch something (It is funny how if you do not catch a bass after about the 3rd trip you start to wonder if you can remember how to fish!!).
I put out some white spinners, mini spinners with minnow, stand up jig with hula grubs, texas rigged dark worms. What I had success on was what my go to has been for 2011- watermelon zoom trick worm texas rigged on spinning rod. And sure enough, caught it in some trees, right about sunset.
This was a kayak fishing trip that I had set out to harvest some fish for an evening dinner. The day was cool and beautiful. I have had some incredible stringers and large catches in the month of September, so I was really looking forward to the fishing!
I was on the main lake and kayaked most of it.....cool temperatures after Labor Day are excellent for kayak fishing, due to the fact that you have most of the lake to yourself, without much motor traffic.
I had a spinning rod with a bottom rig/night crawler set up (which can be a great rig when the panfish really fire up) however, I did not have much luck with that rig. Lake Sherwood has a "Under 12" take all you can Largmouth Bass" set up, so I figured I would try and take enough for a small meal for myself once I got home. I accomplished the goal on this trip!
I had the most success on a texas rigged watermelon trick worm (6")....that has been my "go to" worm this year in regards to bass fishing...once again it delivered!
This was a challenging kayak fishing trip on the Loutre River, Missouri. The word "river" really should be replaced with "stream". I ended up going about 4.5 miles total, but I think half of that time was spent portaging with my kayak cart (really glad I decided to bring it along!). No complaints, however. It was a really nice day to be out, cooler than normal, and windy.
As I looked at the water on this stream, I really started to wonder if there were any fish. Some spots had quite a bit of bright algea growth (I bet some of it had to do with some agricultural run off- some was probably natural).
About half way through the trip, I caught the shadow under the kayak of a huge Gar..big fish, small pool!.
As you watch the film , you will see the typical catch on this stream. No smallmouths, but all Largemouths. I also caught quite a few really small sunfish as well. I had a gold mini spinner, with a red jig head and a plastic minnow. This seemed to really tear them up. Almost all of them were laying deep in structure or in grass next to shore with heavy rocks...structure is key in a small stream.
Now here is what is great about small stream fishing- you are probably the first fisher they have seen! I could tell that this is a spot that a lot of people do not fish. Probably due to the fact that the fish are typically smaller and the effort to get to some of these spots is intense at times. It is a lot of fun to see what you will pull from a stream in Missouri!
Coffeen Lake is one of 3 nice size lakes around Litchefield, IL. I fished this lake in May with my friend Ray off the kayaks, and we had a little success then, so I figured I would come back. I am glad I did....This lake has some really nice Largmouths in it!
The lake is still a little high- I was going to try and paddle the whole lake, but there is a railroad track levy half through it. Due to the high water, you cannot go through the tunnel (it is almost entirely under water.
I caught over (7) bass, a few in the 15-16" range. What I noticed about the ones I caught at this fishery were how fat they were. Little footballs! Also, I noticed what fight they had! I have caught a few bass in last months that have been like catching a branch, but not these. I really thought at first I had landed a smallmouth or something.
My success was based on a spinning rod, with a carolina rig, and a zoom trick worm. I think the secret today was the carolina rig. I think this rig causes action on the worm, but not as much horizontal movement. Could that be the secret to getting on large numbers of bass in the late summer? I am looking forward to trying this at Table Rock Lake in a few weeks as see if it holds true there as well.
I took a few weeks off with the kayak, and decided to dust off the trout gear and fly rods and head out to Roaring River SP (near Cassville, MO) and Bennett Spring SP (near Lebanon, Mo) on this particular week. It felt good to get the waders on again, but it was very hot out.
At Roaring River we fished about 1/2 day, and I caught one on a silver/blue Little Cleo spoon. We also worked powerbait trout worms and eggs, but that was all we caught for the day. The fishing seemed to be a bit slow, possibly due to the heat.
A few days later I hit Bennett Springs. I caught one nice trout on a spoon, and fished every zone.
Started in zone 3 with soft plastic worms, then I went to zone 2 and threw a Little Cleo Spoon (this is where I caught my fish at Bennett, and finally I ended the day in Zone 1 with a fly rod (no luck there). Overall, it was great to get out and do this type of fishing. A lot of things differ between going after bass/panfish type fish and going after trout. It was good to at least get re-versed again in the differences.
