Trout Fishing

lake Taneycomo Report 9/28

In the fall, generation on Taneycomo is dictated mainly by Table Rock's lake level. After last week's rain, Table Rock rose a couple of feet and now rests just below 917 feet, 2 feet above power pool.

The Corp is under a flow restriction. Every fall, the dissolved oxygen levels deep below Table Rock's surface, drop to almost zero. We get our water from Table Rock Lake from a pipe that's 130 feet below the level 915 feet. That's where the low oxygenate water is and that's what we get through the turbine. The state of Missouri deems 6 ppm the minimum for good water quality but the Corp does not have to abide by state law. They set their own levels which is 4 ppm as the minimum levels they will allow. The Corp has to do one of two things to bring the DO level up to a point where fish can survive below it's dam. First, when they turn on and run a turbine, they will only fill it partially giving it a washing machine, sloshing affect, adding oxygen. They also inject liquid oxygen into the turbines, which is very expensive.

Water temperatures have a lot to do with how our trout do in the fall and low DO periods. The colder the water is the better they do. Right now it's 50 degrees which is very good for this time of year.

The restriction at this time is 110 mw. If you look at SPA's generation schedule site - http://www.swpa.gov/generationschedules.aspx - and pick a day like tomorrow - http://www.swpa.gov/gen/mon.htm - you'll see they are going to run 25 mw all day. That's 1/2 a turbine. If you look down on the list of dams, Table Rock #13 shows a maximum of 230 mw or 15,100 cfs. A half a unit isn't much at all. If you're boating, you'll have to watch the gravel bars at Short Creek and above even though there's current. If you're wading, you'll be able to get out on the big bar below outlet #3 and fish the pockets there.

Now for the fishing.

The last few days we've had mixed reports but mainly slow fishing. There's plenty of trout in the lake, especially from Lilleys' Landing upstream. The rainbows stocked the last week have been from the hatchery in Neosho which is operated by the federal gov't. Those trout are always a lot smaller than the rainbows we get from Shepherd of the Hills. We call them silver bullets. People that have been fishing below our place throwing lures have said they've had a lot of follows but no takers. These rainbows will bite, it's just a matter of time. Gulp Eggs will get them, drifting them on the bottom.

I did good fishing with clients on Friday morning, using drift rigs and dragging night crawlers on the bottom from Fall Creek to Short Creek. We did try below Short but didn't do well. The rainbows we caught were decent but not the size Bill Babler has been catching in that area. I'd say they averaged 13 inches. These rainbows were colored up and their meat was orange which means they'd been in the lake for a while.

When cleaning these rainbows, I found something I've never seen before. Small crawdads. They were about 3/8-inch long - very small. At first glance, I thought they were freshwater shrimp. It would be very cool if crawdad took hold and grew in our upper lake. It would be a much needed, additional food source.

I did get out and fished yesterday afternoon. I concentrated on the area from Lookout Island to Fall Creek. One unit of flow allows you to do alot of things along the bluff bank including throwing dries in the eddies and dead drifting different nymphs. I tried a #14 olive elk hair caddis for alittle while buy had no takers. So I dropped a #14 red zebra under a palsa indicator 3 feet and drifted it where I could in the current and eddies. I didn't get rich but did catch a half dozen on the long drift to the narrows before heading back up to try the other side of the lake.

On the shallow side, I found more rainbows but they seemed to be grouped up. I'd catch a couple in one area and then nothing for along time. I tied a #14 gray scud under the zebra and caught one but because of the wind, I tangled up twice in a row and gave up on the combination.

The last couple of drifts, before getting dark, I went back to my old faithful -- my sculpin 1/8th oz jig. I worked the middle of the lake and kept it as close to the bottom as possible. I was getting multiply strikes on almost every cast but just could not hook 'em. I trimmed the marabou on my jig and started hooking them a bit better but still missed more than I got.

Wish I could post pics here... had a beautiful 15-pound-plus rainbow caught and released last week here. I just so happened to be close and got some pics of it, along with a video of him releasing it. You can see and read about it on ozarkanglers here -

http://ozarkanglers.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=19415

Also, if you're interested in my facebook fishing entries, search me out - Phil Lilley