Fishing is for all seasons

Mark Twain had it right when he said, "If you don't like the weather in Missouri, just wait a while and it will change."

Two weekends ago we were building snowmen and having snowball fights in the backyard. This past weekend we were having a family fish fry and playing games like croquet in the same backyard.

And so it goes with the outdoorsman. On the opening day of the antlerless portion of the deer season, Dec. 9, hunters were spotting deer in the snow, adding more than 23,000 more deer to the record year with 276 checked in Vernon County, while the next weekend many of the same hunters were at the lake fishing in spring-like weather.

Many of the anglers were catching fish, including me and my daughter. Using a new ultralight fishing rod and reel from B-n-M out of West Point, Miss., and a smoke colored jig, we caught lots of crappie over 10 inches and I managed to haul in a 6-pound walleye.

Crappie fishing has been good in most of the state's big impoundments and the bass anglers who love to fish with jerk baits are starting to catch fish. Les Jarman, Stockton, was out one day last week and caught five keeper bass and had 15 others using his favorite lure, a jerk bait.

Harry Butler, Warrensburg, was fishing jerk baits at Pomme de Terre last week and limited out on bass in less than two hours. "It was some of the best fishing I have had all year," he said.

Getting back to crappie fishing, Jack Wilson, Sedalia, took a limit of 15 crappie while fishing at Table Rock and two days later he caught another limit of crappie at Stockton. "It's unusual to have both good fishing and good weather in December and boy oh boy, those fish were really tasty out of that cold water. I have a favorite winter crappie spot at the Lake of the Ozarks where I will be spending a lot of time between now and spring. After seeing the fishing forecast last week it looked like there was no good fishing at most of the lakes, but I found it otherwise," Wilson said.

The Sedalia angler went on to say, "Several years ago, I saw some guys fishing through the ice at Jacomo so I tried it and, to my surprise, I caught crappie. Ever since then, I have caught lots of crappie in the winter and it has a lot of advantages -- including not many other anglers, no bugs to deal with and the best part is catching and eating crappie."

We encountered the fishing Longs last week. This 80-plus year-old couple fish for crappie all year and even on Christmas some years. Just as we arrived Earl Long was pulling in a nice fish and while I watched both anglers were bringing in fish. "There isn't a bad day fishing all year," Earl said. "If the roads are passable, we will be at the lake fishing for crappie. Sometime the catching isn't too good, but the fishing is always good."