Mississippi River - Pool 26 (Dardene Creek & Pole Star

The discussion of tonight's fishing trip started early in the day. We had to watch the radar close as there were some pretty severe storms headed towards St. Louis. At 5:00 we decided the worse portion of the storms would be south of us so we were going to try to get our fishing trip in. It was raining when we got to the harbor, but isn't that why we spend all that money on good rain gear? We put the Skeeter in at Riverside and decided to just start working the shorline right there and work our way up into Dardene Creek. There was a lot of good rip-rap to work, but spinner baits produced no bites. There were a lot of bait fish jumping, but no bass. So we decided to make a run to one of my favorite harbors, Pole Star. By now the rain had quit and the water was just glass. A 65 MPH run down to Pole Star took very little time and we were fishing again. We have heard rumors that crappie can be caught around the docks here so the plan was to work the rip-rap for bass and then as we had to move around the docks, get the crappie rigs out and work the docks, the work the rip-rap for bass again. We worked our way in, throwing spinners off the front and the back of the boat. Up on the shoreline and out just a bit. Then we setup the 10' crappie rods with jigs and Power Baits. Worked these around the edges of the dock. As we came around the backside of the first dock I got a hit. I was a bit excited, I thought I had an awesome crappie on. Instead, I had to play out a nice 15", 1lb 8oz bass. This is on a 10' crappie pole with a itty-bitty crappie real and 4lb line. It really wasn't that bad, but it was a nice fish. We contiuned with our plan, alternating between the two poles as we made our way to the back of Pole Star. Right at the sunset I was working a plastic bait up on the shore in this little hole and my line moved from one side of the boat to the other. I reeled down and felt tention so I set the hook. Pulled it out of it's mouth. Quick fix the hook and I threw it back up in there. Nothing. Again back up in there, apologizing to Matt for holding this spot, nothing. Once again, up in the same spot, working very slow. Tap, Tap, Tap... I hold on. The bait starts to move again, I reel down, feel tention on the line and set the hook. Bait comes out of the water, no fish. At this point it's getting dark. I threw in there 3 more times and didn't get another hit. Matt and I decided to call it a day and run for the house. What started as a wet nasty evening turned into a great night on the river. Got a busy weekend coming up so it'll probably be next Tuesday before we get out on the Skeeter again. - cld

Mark Twain Lake (modified)

It finally happened. We went up to Mark Twain Lake this weekend to do a little crappie fishing and take my nephew fishing for the first time and we actually got into them. They were post-spawn, but they were just coming off the banks and setting up on the trees. It was a whole lot of fun. I went up Saturday morning and got on the lake around 7:00. The first stop was our honey hole up in Little Indian Creek. This area produced one crappie off a tree and a lot of sunfish. I actually left up there due to the amount of sunfish. Next I shot over to Dry Fork. This is where I started working the trees. I was finding them about 18 inches down, right on the trees. The water was fairly murky and about 75º with clear skies and a high around 85º with a steady to falling barometer. You had to lay your jig in there just right to get them to hit. The were lying in the shadow of the tree so you had to work not only the tree, but the shadows too. I had 6 in the boat (all over 9”, mostly 10”+) by noon when Dave and Ryan got there. Most of them were caught before 10:00, after that, the bite stopped. We took Ryan back up to Little Indian Creek and let him catch some bluegill since we knew they were stacked in there. He had fun and we only caught one more crappie before we pulled out around 3:30/4:00.


Sunday was a whole lot better. First thing that morning we made a run to Pigeon Roost. We hit a cove in there and tried to fish the bank. We had heard rumors they were still spawning, but this was just a rumor as after an hour or so, we had not caught a fish. We then switched back to working the trees in the same cove. Sure enough, we started catching fish. Conditions were identical to the day before except the crappier were spread out in the water column. We found them anywhere from 6 feet down to 18 inches down. Again, the 10-foot pole worked perfectly for this. Ryan was working a jig under a bobber and cast just beyond the base of a tree. He worked it up to the tree and let it stand. It took about 10 seconds and he was reeling as fast as he could. He put a 12-inch crappie in the boat, laid his pole down and said he had the biggest fish of the day and he was done. It was pretty funny and it was a really good fish. By the noon that day we had 9 fish in the boat and took Dave and Ryan in to head for home. They took the fish home to share with their family and Les got in the boat with me as we headed back to Dry Fork to catch 11 more which would give me a limit and enough to take home and feed us and our wives. Again, they were stacked on the trees about 4 feet down. The water temp was near 80º and murky. We didn’t use minnows all weekend. We were using a chartreuse jigs and Gulp! Crappie Niblets. I don’t know if I’ll ever buy another minnow again, unless I’m in Canada. It was a great tip that I have to thank the people at South Fork for. I got some more tips at the cleaning station on Sunday evening, but I’ll have to try them out for myself before I pass them along. We went out in the pouring rain on Monday, but didn't catch any keepers and after an hour of fishing in a downpour we threw in the towel and headed for home. It was a great trip and I’m looking forward to more trips up there this summer.

Mississippi River – Pool 26 (Peruque Creek)

Jeffery and I headed out Tuesday evening to see if we could finally catch a fish on the Mississippi River. Up to this point I had not had much luck heading south (east) out of Riverside Harbor, so we headed north to Peruque Creek. I had been up there one other time and it looks like a place that should hold fish. A front was moving through on Tuesday evening. The weather forecast was for rain late Tuesday evening, but not until after dark, so we were going to miss any heavy stuff. However, the wind was picking up, coming out of the SSE which made the main river just a little choppy. It was quite a boat ride (I don’t know how to go slow). When we got to Peruque the water temp was 66° with a falling barometer. The water was high and falling. At 7:00 Winfield Dam TW was 25.12 and Grafton was at 20.57. We started with spinner baits. I was using a heavier white and red while Jeff stuck to the chartreuse. We thought we were getting small bites, but couldn’t figure out what it was. We switched to small in-line spinner baits (Rooster Tails) and again got small hits. We were watching the Japanese Carp rolling all around us and then we realized that we are probably just snagging up on them. Needless to say, we worked up and down the creek and threw everything at them including spinner baits, in-line spinners, jigs, you name it. We even stopped and bobber fished to see if there were any crappie or bluegill in there. No luck. So at this point the Mississippi River has yet to produce a fish in the Skeeter. We will continue to try. I’ve gotta learn to fish the River. It’s just too close to home to pass up. - cld

Mark Twain, Salt River & J Lake

This past weekend we got together for the annual bowling team fishing trip up at Mark Twain. Some took off on Friday, while the rest of us got up there after work. On Friday, the forecast was for rain and cooler temperatures all weekend. Luckily the rain didn't make it to us, but the cooler temperatures did. Jeff and I hit the lake at 7:00 Friday evening where we were greeted with high, muddy water and lots of trash floating in the Lake. The other guys had been up in Little Indian Creek all day and only had 3 fish, so we figured we would try somewhere else. We got the boat in the water and ran to Dry Fork. Dry Fork was really, really muddy and only 55#&176;. Not knowing where they were yet, we dabbled the edges of the shorline about 3-feet out with a jig and minnow combo, but caught nothing. We ran out of there about 8:30 and pulled out. The following day we ran north to Little Indian Creek and started with the same pattern we were using in Dry Fork. We dabbled the shorline edges about 3' out with a jig head and minnow (no skirt) and again, nothing so we moved to working the trees. This produced a few fish, but they were scattered and hard to find. The combo seemed to be 18-feet of water at about 3 to 6-foot down right against the tree. The water temperature was about 64#&176; in Little Indian Creek, while the air temperature started in the 50s and got up to the upper 60s. We worked several coves in Little Indian and then ended up working bobbers along the shorline, 12 to 18-inches below the surface at 1 to 3-feet off the edge. Between the two boats, this produced 6 or 7 fish, but only 2 keepers. For the first full day of fishing we ended up with 11 fish between 3 boats. Not a stellar day. Which is why we decided to try below the dam on Sunday. Being in fiberglass boats, we didn't pull up on the rocks right below the dam, so we tied up to some trees down below the rocks and worked the small eddies along the bank. We caught several fish, but only 3 that were close to keepers, and they weren't even that big. Water temp was only 55#&176;, with the air temp reaching the lower 70s for the day. After fighting the current for half the day, we decided to give J Lake a try. By 2:00 we were on J Lake. The water temp in J was 65#&176;, high and muddy. Similar to the rest of the waters we fished over the weekend. The lake edges are really shallow. We targeted bass, while some of the other targeted crappie. No one produced anything. We threw worms, spinners, jigs, buzz baits, you name it, we threw it. Oh well, maybe when the water coditions are a little better.

Mark Twain Lake - Little Indian, Lick & Dry Fork

Les and I had the opportunity to take the day off today and get up to Mark Twain Lake for a little crappie fishing. The weater forecast was right on target. High of 84 (it reached 87) with winds out of the SSW at 20-30 with partial overcast. Minus the wind, a beautiful spring day. Well, we weren't the only ones with this idea. The lake was packed. We left St. Charles at 6:45 and pulled off the trailer just after 9:00. We decided to start on the north side of the lake and made a quick run up to Little Indian Creek. We went about half way back and worked the edge of the tree line off the edge of the bank. As we worked our way back out I caught our first fish of the day. A 12" crappie. OK, we figured this was not going to be a bad day. The water temp up there was 52°, so it was a bit on the cooler side. No spawning yet. That was the last bite we had up there so after about 2 hours we decided to run back down south and check out Lick Creek. I guess I'm use to the lake being high because it seemed really low, but it was right at normal pool (609.6). We hit a couple coves back in Lick Creek, and found nothing except shelter from the wind. The water temp was much warmer. 57° in the main creek. Next we ran up into Dry Fork, with the rest of the people on the lake. One thing that everyone had in common, no one was catching fish. Most people had one or two, but that was it. After working back up into Dry Fork, I caught one small male and on the way out Les landed a good sized crappie, we were done for the day. 3 fish in the livewell is not a spectacular day. However, the water temp in Dry Fork was 61°, so with a little luck, we will be on target next weekend. Otherwise it will be a VERY long weekend. I have to make mention that we talked to some really nice folks on the water today. There are always those that would rather spit on you than say hello, but for the most part everyone was talkative and sharing information. A lot of people from Illinois and a few fellow Skeeter Owner's from Hannibal, Mo. Here is the Google Earth file from the trip. Hopefully we will get back on the river Tuesday evening before making the run back up to Mark Twain Friday night (Sat., Sun. & Mon.). - cld

Tuesday at Twain

My boss, Joe, and I played hooky from work today and ran up to Mark Twain. Since neither of us have a fishing boat we rented from Indian Creek. The morning was pretty bad. Tornadoes rolled through which forced us back into the harbor. The afternoon wasn't much better but I did manage to catch a nice 12" crappie. With the water up this high and the changing weather they don't know if they want to spawn or not. Guess we'll just have to keep going back!

Fish ON!

Bryan and I (Adam) did some fishing at the regular super secret lakes around town on Sunday afternoon. As you can see from the second picture the females are just about ready to bed. Biggest of the day was 23 inches (Bryan's) and my biggest (above) was 21. Caught around 30-40 in the 11-20 inch range also. We also caught about 15 crappie, a few keepers. Only got one picture of them below.

Air temp : 75

Sunny, no clouds.

Water Color : Gin Clear

Water Temp : Getting There. :)

1st Crappie of the year

Ok i didn't have much time and i got a pass to do a little fishing on Sunday. I went to New Town and didn't catch anything. I cooked it over to Cart and caught 3 fish. Two were little bass and one was a nice crappie it was a KEEPER!! The