We have had a few days of more seasonal weather.  Friday never made it out of the low 40s and despite the weather forecast, which called for sunshine and mid 40s by afternoon, temperatures dropped and we never saw the light!  Yesterday was another 40s day, but we did see some sun.  Today it’s working its way into the low 30s but there is lots of sunshine and very little wind.  Tomorrow, according to the forecast, is not going to be very nice.  Looks like light snow in the morning, wintry mix by afternoon with the high in the low 30s.  Maybe an inch of something.  Good news is that by Tuesday, we will be back into the 40s, maybe even mid 40s.  Maybe some showers Wednesday, but back into the 50s by the weekend. 

Generation has been pretty non-stop except for 4-5 hours from midnight until early the next morning.  Almost every day they cut back the generators to one for six hours or so, so there is some limited wading during this time.

Carolyn out Friday afternoon with Josh from Salem, Missouri and his uncle, David.  This was that day it was supposed to warm up and sunny up in the afternoon….NOT.  As a matter of fact, by the time we came off the water, it was 33 degrees according to the gauge in the car.  The worst part of the day was the wind.  Couple generators going and the wind would take us up stream.  Tough on the casters!  Despite the less than desirable weather, it was a pretty good day on the creek!  We pulled fish on at a pretty steady pace all afternoon on the red size 12 tungsten midge.  Also well on the red San Juan worm as long as the tungsten bead was in tact.

Another beautiful day in the Ozarks! We keep saying, “how much longer can we be so lucky?” Today was in the low 50s with lots of sunshine and very little wind. Tomorrow looks like low 50s and the possibility of precipitation by tomorrow afternoon or evening into early Wednesday. Dry through the weekend, with temperatures for the most part in the 40s.

We had lots of off generation time over the past weekend. They had it on for a while this morning, but it was off by 9:00 a.m. (not in accordance with the projection) and it stayed off until 3:00 p.m. when they really opened it up. Tomorrow looks like generation all day with it shut back to the equivalent of one generator from 11:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m…..to be continued.

With the water off over the weekend, quite a few fishers on the water. Most of the reports were good on catching. One of our customers caught a nice 22 inch brown pulling a orange streamer he had tied. Another guy caught a 20 inch rainbow on our mouse gray articulated sculpin. Several others doing well on the gray scuds and copper dun midges.

Jim on the water today with Marge and Price from Kansas. They had a good day, until they fired up the generators at 3:00 p.m., on the red ass soft hackle, a holographic green crackleback, and the olive/black sculpins.

Weather continues to be unbelievable! We are supposed to see this nice weather for at least a couple more days. today should be in the 60s, but windy! and tomorrow and Thursday are predicted to be in the low 60s. Friday looks like 50s, and by Saturday and Sunday, maybe the upper 40s.

Wish the generation schedule would be as cooperative as the weather has been. For the past five days we have see non-stop generation most of the day. At least during my waking hours. I don’t do well fishing from 11;00 p.m. until 5:00 or so in the morning. Today’s projection is more of the same. They have on most days, shut it down to one generator from about noon until 5:00 p.m., but today they are not shutting it down quite that much. So much for wading. We’ll just look this afternoon at 4:30 and see if the projection is more of the same.

Rick and Kristi decided they better get out and cast out any cobwebs this past Sunday. They are getting ready to go fishing for steelhead in Oregon in February and had not thrown a line for a few months. They spent half a day on the water with Stan this past Sunday and they had a very good day of casting and catching on the red midge. Rick stripped a holographic green crackleback a little and caught a few fish on that, but the red midge was the pattern Sunday. It would have been a perfectly perfect day if the wind had not been blowing so much….good temperature and good fishing!

I think we got all of the rain out of the area this morning. Still overcast, but I can see it clearing to the southwest and our temperature is around 40 degrees. Don’t think it is going to make the low 50s as predicted a couple days ago. Still looks like mid 50s for Friday and partly cloudy. Mid 40s Saturday and low 50s Sunday with sunshine.

Today’s generation schedule projected no generation from 9:00 a.m. until 6:00 p.m. today. Guess what! It is almost 1:00 p.m. and they have been running one generator since around 10:00 a.m. Looks like that will be the generation most of the day. Good news is that at this level, you can do some wading around and below the fish ladder area (aka outlet 3).

A couple Mondays ago, January 16, Jim had Harry and Carl on the water. Harry caught a nice brown and just sent me the picture today…so here it is. Nice brown!

Other than today, with the rain and temperatures in the upper 30s, we continue to have pretty nice weather. Thursday, the prediction is low 50s and partly cloudy. The rain should end early tomorrow morning. Friday we are still looking at partly cloudy with temperatures in the mid 50s. Saturday, partly sunny and mid 40s, with Sunday full sunshine and about 50.

This past Monday and Tuesday, the generation projection was for water most of the day. In reality, we had no generation for 5 hours Monday and almost 8 hours yesterday. Today, the projection was for off water during the middle of the day…and it is. Tomorrow, more of the same, no generation from about 9:00 a.m. until 6:00 p.m.

With the water off yesterday, a few people were fishing. Still lots of different patterns working. While it was sunny on Monday, the primrose & pearl midge was working great. Yesterday, with the wind and chop on the water, the olive wooly bugger was working as was a beadhead hare’s ear. Good fishing on this pattern for Shannon and Mac at the Rocking Chair area. The Big Ugly with a midge dropper near the bank fished good for Darrell. Seeing some nice rainbows showing up.

Just a little heads up for all the people who fish Missouri’s cold-water trout hatcheries and the upper portion of Lake Taneycomo here in Branson, Missouri.  Effective March 1, 2012, porous-soled waders and wading boots will be banned.  They are trying to prevent the introduction of Didymo, commonly referred to as “rock snot”.  This alga is not currently found in Missouri, however, didymo is as close as the White River just south of Missouri’s border.  Felt-sole waders and wading boots, worn by many trout anglers, appear to be a likely pathway for the spread of didymo.  Felt soles are porous and hold moisture for days.  A single cell of didymo can survive in the sole of the boot and then be introduced unknowingly to the next stream the angler visits.  The Missouri Department of Conservation has found a temporary fix for felt-soled waders or boots to make them non-porous.  You can check this out by going to:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_udcfZqA_w

On a more pleasant subject, fishing continues to be good.  Beautiful day out there today and not only are they catching lots of trout, one fellow who came in this morning caught about a 10 pound walleye yesterday.  Surprised him!  Thought he has a really nice brown on.

Well, they backed off the weather forecast a little from earlier this week.  Looks like we will only be in the upper 40s Thursday, low 50s Friday and Saturday and low to mid 60s Sunday.  No rain in the forecast until Tuesday.  We did have a cold front come through early Tuesday.  Cold yesterday and it was in the teens this morning.  Good news….I see lots of sunshine and it is supposed to be in the mid 40s today.  As long as we keep seeing all these good days, it is just one less day of winter weather…..January is over half over.

The generation schedule has been pretty close.   We did have lots of off generation over the weekend as projected.  Monday we had generation in the morning, off for 7 or so hours, then back on for a couple.  It was off  yesterday until 6:00 p.m.  They had projected some generation in the a.m., but it did not happen.  So far today, they are right on.  We are seeing the four generators right not and should have generation until noon; off for only four hours today, and then back on.  As always….to be continued!

Monday, a couple guys from the Carthage area, Harry and his friend, Carl, spent the day on the water with Jim.  I know Harry had a great day.  He landed a beautiful 25 inch, heavy girth Brown!  They estimated it at about 8 pounds.  Caught this beauty pulling Jim’s jailhouse sculpin.  They also landed some fish on the red and a San Juan dropper.  With the water off, they had the water flowing back upstream experience.  Pretty interesting when you see your patterns going up instead of downstream! 

Know I sound like a broken record, but it is fishing very good.  One of our customers came in late yesterday and said he had caught over 50 fish yesterday afternoon, mainly pulling olive buggers.  A young man and his father were in Monday and they had each caught over 20 in just a few hours that morning.

Wow!  Have we been fortunate with the weather.  The weekends have been very nice, 50s and 60s, and sunshine.  We have a cold day in the middle of the week and then it starts warming up for the weekend.  Usually, we have great weather during the week and the weekend goes to pot!  Love it!  We are expecting a cold front to come in tonight which will cooling down tomorrow and Wednesday.  By Thursday, we will be back into the mid 50s, low to mid 60s Friday and Saturday and upper 60s Sunday. 

The generation schedule this past week and over the weekend was pretty nice to the waders.  Starting Wednesday, we had a 5-7 hour window of no generation starting from late morning until late afternoon.  Over the weekend, after they fired it up for four hours in the morning, it was off the balance of the day and only ran a couple hours on Sunday.  According to the projection, we should see that window of no generation around 10:00 a.m.   That and this nice weather doesn’t get much better.

Except, fishing has also been very cooperative.  Stan took Brad and his son Clay out for half a day float last Wednesday.  Great day on the water.  Lots of fish on the primrose & pearl midge as well as stripping the holographic green crackleback.  Brad and Clay are from Kansas and were very happy to see such a good fishery so close to home. 

One of our customers, Freddie, had a good morning yesterday pulling the 56er.  Another customer said he had a good time pulling small soft hackles.   Sounds like we ought to take advantage of this great weather and go fishing.

If you did not fish this past weekend, you missed out on some great weather.  Starting with last Thursday, we had temperatures in the 60s and Friday, I know it reached 70.  Saturday was still great, in the upper 50s.  Yesterday started cooling down and today we are expecting mid 50s.  Still not too bad.  Looks liks low to mid 50s until Thursday when it will cool down to the 30s!  Also, we are expecting rain some time tomorrow.  Friday and Saturday, not too bad….40s and sunshine.  

Generation has been great…or should I say the lack of generation has been great!  At 10:00 a.m. Thursday, the generators shut down and stayed off until 6:00 a.m. Friday morning when they were on for only three hours.  From 9:00 a.m. Friday morning until 6:00 p.m. Saturday evening, we had no generation.  They shut down Saturday at 10:00 p.m. and stayed off until 6:00 p.m. yesterday.  They are on this morning, but the projection is for shut down around noon, and off for 5-6 hours.  Maybe we will see the same generation pattern we had most of last week which was off for 5-7 hours during the middle of each day. 

Thursday, Stan and Doc celebrated Doc’s 78th birthday early.  Doc tries to fish on his birthday, weather permitting, and he had something to do this year, so they did it early.  Doc had a great birthday trip.  Lots of fish on the primrose & pearl midge early in the day then the copper dun for the drift out.  Meanwhile, Jim had Jack and his wife, Joanna, from Indiana, out both Thursday and Friday.  They had a couple of very good days using the rusty midge with the blood worm dropper, and stripping an olive brown sculpin or the olive bug eyed bugger.  Of course, they had a couple days of great weather too!

Friday, Stan had Frank, from St. Louis, out for half a day.  They spent the whole trip pulling and catching on the holographic green crackleback with and without a sinking leader.  Lots of fish taking this.  They tried a few other streamer patterns, but this is what they wanted.  Mike, from Oklahoma, but also has a place here in Branson, spent half a day on the water with Carolyn.  They too found that the holographic green crackleback was the fly of choice….lots of fish to the boat.   This was definitely a picture perfect day.  Very good fishing and before the trip was over, Mike had taken his heavy jacket off and was fishing in his short sleeve shirt!

Saturday afternoon, Carolyn had Lewis, from St. Louis, on the river.  Fun day of catching and they did not want the holographic green crackleback that day.  Nope!  It was a size 16 gray scud under a size 12 UV gray scud.  I asked Lewis how many fish he caught and he said, “piles”.   

We are still seeing and catching lots of smaller fish, but we are also starting to see more of the normal size, 15-18 inches.  Almost all of the larger fish we caught over the past few days were spawning males….good color, good fighters, wide sides, and solid.

Wow!  Other than yesterday and today, the weather has been very nice, especially for this time of the year.  New Year’s day was a bit windy, but temperatures were in the low 50s.  Yesterday, it was in the 40s, but the wind was really a killer.  Today is going to be in the 40s, tomorrow in the 50s, and Thursday and Friday in the low 60s, with sunshine every day.  Looking for a little cooler over the weekend and party cloudy. 

Generation for the New Year was wonderful.  We had no generation all day New Years until 4:00 p.m.  Yesterday it did not come on until around 5:00 p.m.  Today, as projected, generation shut down at 11:00 a.m. and should be off until 6:00 p.m. 

Let’s see….New Year’s eve day, Stan had half a day with Ken from Kansas….same guy who spent Christmas eve day with Stan.  He knows how to beat the stress of the season.  They had another very good day on the water drifting the primrose & pearl midge or stripping an olive bead head wooly bugger or a size 12 flasher.  Jim had Jerry and his friend David, from Tennessee, out for the afternoon.  These guys had a steady streamer day using the brown or olive sculpins.  Also drifting the red midge with a red San Juan dropper.  Fishing was good!.

New Year’s Day, what can I say.  A dozen of the ladies from the River Runners Womens Fly Fishing Club took over a good section of the river below the boat ramp.  It was a wonderful day.   Almost every time I looked upstream or down stream, someone or several, had a fish on.  Tried to get a picture of one of the gals, Valley, with a rod in one hand with a fish on, and eating a brownine with the other hand.  Unfortunately, my batteries were dead!  It was certainly a magic day and we all had a fun day, laughing and catching fish.  What was working?  Olive wooly buggers, tan scuds, gray scuds, UV gray scuds, copper dun midges, holographic green cracklebacks, flashers, olive sculpin patern, primrose & pearl midges.  These are some of the patterns I know were being used.  Upstream, Stan was with two of our friends, Bob and Linda Parker, from Olathe, Kansas.  They were wearing out their arms catching fish on the holographic green crackleback.  I must admit, there were a lot of smaller fish, but we caught enough of the nicer ones to keep us happy….or I should say, happier.

Two of the ladies, Valley and Julie,  just could not drag themselves away from such good fishing, so they stayed and fished again yesterday.  The generation was again off until afternoon.  Another great day on the water fishing scuds and pulling the olive sculpin or holographic green crackleback.