Lake Taneycomo & White River Overall Fly Fishing Report December 3 2012

I’ve been everywhere man, all across this land man. I know this has been a while since I’ve written a fishing report, but this year has been crazy. I really don’t even know where to start, but I’ll do my best to give you an overall on fishing the last few months, the brown run this year and how the streamer fishing has been here in the Ozark’s.

Overall Report for Taneycomo

Let’s start with the brown run. It was a bust this year and us locals are scrathing our heads wondering did this last years flood finally do the bigger browns in. There is a lot of speculation on what really did happen. Did they die from the water being to hot from continued generation in the summer months? Could it be they got flushed over the spillway in Powersite? Or was it just something that preventing them from coming upstream to spawn this year? My guess would be the warm water over anything else. But then I ask myself, how can big browns get caught all year round in the lower streatch (mainly just up from Lilley’s Landing down to Scotty’s Trout Dock) and then nothing to speak of during the brown run that typically is always a quarantee in the month of October and early November. Yes, I saw a few, but nothing like we are use to seeing. I saw more bigger rainbows than browns, which there’s nothing wrong with that by any means. I really believe Taneycomo is shaping up to be a world class rainbow fishery. If you want browns more consistanly I would gamble with the White River, but we do have our one month out of the year that is hard to be for big trophy browns. I guess the thing we have to do is to see what next year brings, and if it looks like the same results I would say we lost alot of trophy browns that have been in Taneycomo for a long time. If this is the case I would say we are in for a long waiting game to get them that size again.

With saying that, I have seen a bunch of two year old browns below the Table Rock Dam area during the run so that’s a good sign that we do have a bunch in the river. It’s just going to be awhile before we see these browns get into the 20-23 inch class. I’m sure it’s all ppositive signs for what this river can offer years to come. I wish I knew for sure, but only time will tell. I did catch a few over 20 inches during the brown run, but few and far between. It’s still a great fishery and has it days when it can offer you some of the best trout fishing we have in the Ozark’s for rainbows that’s a fact!

How’s Taneycomo Fishing Now?

With the lakes still down, we are proud to write in this fishing report that there is still going to be plenty of low water throughout the week. The weekends have been more of the steady around the clock generations so planning a trip during the week is more of a quarantee for low water as of lately. Of course this time of year can offer some of the best midge fishing we have in the area, you still have options to throw sculpns, scuds, trout crack, wd40’s, soft hackles, swinging crackleback’s just to name a few. All I can say is it’s all working right now. Just depends on your prefrence on how you want to fish.

The number one way to catch numbers right now is midge patterns. Any zebra midge pattern will work, but make sure you have 16’s and 18’s in your box. If I’m fishing deeper then three feet I go with a 16. Anything under three feet I throw 18’s. The best pattern hands down is the Rusty midge followed up with Physco midge/ P&P. If you’re a soft hackle fan, this is the time you want be swinging sof hackles. We are defintely seeing a abundance of midges flying in the air so these insects are hatching by the thousands right now. Just look up in the air if you don’t believe me, lol. Another fly working great is John Wilson’s pattern called the trout crack. I sell on the site if you don’t have any, just shoot me an email and we can get some sent out to you in the mail no problem.

Fishing Report for the White River

This is where I’ve been doing more of my trips as of lately. WIth most being streamer trips, I’ve been focusing my attention here, but it really has been a hit or miss stripping bigger articulated streamers. The last two mondays we had cloud cover with some light rain and the streamer bite was hot. Since I really only try planning these trips in running water and or on cloudy days it has been difficult to predict a successful streamer trip. I think right now the thing to do is fish cloud cover with some rain showers for better results. We’re catching lots of smaller browns, but the bigger ones are staying at rest for the most part why they are doing their “thing”. I’m staying more downstream from Wildcat down to Rim Shaols and not really trying to bug the ones up in the State Park and Cane Island right now.

The flows have also been great down here with usually fishing 2-4 units depending on mornings verses afternoons. I like the evening bite as of lately when throwing streamers because we are getting bigger strikes in the “twilight” hour. That and the water levels seem to be a little higher on where I’m trying to gage my floats. If you like indicator fishing the mornings have been better.

On another note, the hopper bite went stong all the way through October and a little in November if the days were bright and a little warmer. One thing I notice was some of these browns looked like snakes, big head little bodies, but you only saw it in the later months. I really didn’t see this in August and September, but I’ll be honest with you, I wasn’t able to spend the time I would have like to because I had 80 percent of my trips at Taneycomo. I guess it’s where you write the most is where you get booked the most and a lot of that was the case this year.

Winter streamer fishing is right around the corner – Plan your trip now!!

We all know the White is getting alot of attention in the last few years with everybody gearing up for the big trophy browns that love chasing big streamers in late January and all the way through February. This is when you want to get ready to catch the brown of your life. This is the easiest two months to target these monsters here on the White River with fly rods without working your tail off with a indicator rig hunting all day for one of these browns. This type of fishing can be difficult for beginners, especially if you don’t have your cast dialed in, but if you have a somewhat of a accurate cast and can put it where you want it, then you’ll find this not be as difficult as it seems. To me it’s easier to target these big browns alot easier than nymph fishing. In my opinion, the hardest part about this is being able to cast a 8wt all day and if you try to hard by throwing it and not letting the line do the work I can promise you, you will get sore and probably won’t be able to cast this type of set up all day. With a little insrtuction , it can change things pretty quick.

The Creeks

Our local creeks that we fish in the Winter are dried up and will continue to be unless we get some well needed rain. I don’t see that happening in the near future so it looks like this year might not be as good as the last few during the floods. A few will have some hanging around in the mouths of the creeks, but we will have to get colder temps and a little more rainfall in the months to come to draw them in.

Tying Class

The good news is, classes are starting back up!! The first one will be held on December 22nd between 2-4pm. We will be tying streamers for the next couple of months gearing up for the browns during the winter months. Class will be held at the Shepherd of the Hills fish hatchery located on hwy 165 right below Table Rock Dam. I hope to see some new faces along with the regulars. Don’t miss out, they are free to the public and all you have to do is email at flytiehunt@hotmail.com or call the hatchery to confirm your spot. It’s always a plus to bring a vise and your tools, but I will furnish all the fly tying materials. If you don’t have a vise one will be provided and if you are new to tying and want to watch feel free to do that as well. We would love to see you at class so get ready to tie and have some fish stories told doing it!!

December Christmas Promotion

Well, it’s that time of the year and I always do this for my fellow fly fishers who follow the site. I usually do this through a bulk email to my subscribers, but I felt like offering this to anyone who ends up reading this report.

I’m offering my same deal I’ve done for the last three years;

The rivers you can choose – Lake Taneycomo, White River, Norfork Tailwater & Beaver Tailwater

2 full days of fly fishing any river you want for 500.00

3 full days of fly fishing any river you want for 700.00

This is a perfect way to learn streamer fishing in the months to come for a great price!! This promotion will be good until you redeem it. I’m not going anywhere so use it when you want. I’ll be guiding for the rest of my life so that’s why I say I will honor it always. The only way to get this deal is you have to purchase it no later than January 3 2013.

I also wanted to mention you can spread your days out. So if you don’t want to use all the days at once, you can come back you can use it and fish a totally different river then the one you did before.

I have set up a paypal link for both if you would like to pay through paypal. If you don’t have paypal account you can send me an email at flysandguides@outlook.com and we can go from there on how you want to pay. If you would like for me to email you a file to be able to print off this as a christmas gift certificate just let me know. I’ll be glad to do it.

This is my way of giving back to everyone who reads my site. Thank you so much.

Two Full Days for 2 People

$500.00

Three Full Days for 2 People

$700.00

In conclusion

I wanted to let everyone know that I’m getting closer to launching my new website. It’s been a long road and I had to learn a bunch of new stuff to make sure this site was done correctly because this is the last time I’m going to back track. This will be my fourth website in seven years and I think I’ve got it up to speed with the latest social media side of technology. It’s took every free time I’ve had for the last six months. I’m not trying to make excuses, but I was totally burned out on the old site and didn’t have it in me to update it as much as I should’ve. This new site will be updating on a regular basis and I’m excited about it and I think you will be also.

Fly Tying Orders

I want to say to all the people who bought flies from me and or referred your friends, I thank you for you business. It is greatly appreciated and keeps me doing what I love, teaching the sport of fly fishing to all levels of the sport.

I also have great news, the new site has a shopping cart so it will be alot more user friendly for you to shop. Stay tuned for that as it will be something I will continue to upload on a regualr basis with many more of my fly patterns. I’ve kept alot of them under my hat, but I’m going to offer them for sell finally.

Feel free to visit us on Facebook, If you really liked this article, +1 above – check us out at +flysandguides (Google+) or send us a tweet with a question or just to say hi. Check out the Fly of the Month! You can also see the latest fishing report and other fly fishing tips by subscribing to our newsletter! So the last thing I want to say….Happy Holidays and I’ll see you in 2013!!!