Back-water and Green Leaves

On Millwood Lake, many Junes ago,
Floyd Mabry entices a bass from a jungle of flooded greenery on a topwater
lure.

 I saw Bull Shoals Lake this past week, filled with water higher than it has ever been since the massive dam on the White River created it more than 60 years ago. The White River below the dam is also flowing more water than ever before, and has wreaked havoc on trout docks and resorts. Gaston’s White River resort had removed all their boats and one end of their dock, which probably accounts for one fifth of their boat slips, had been crumpled and destroyed by the high water. Stetson’s resort, one of the prettiest places on the White, had water flowing into their offices at one point, and docks on the lower part of the river toward Cotter had suffered similar flooding, and damage.

Because of the time of year, Bull Shoals, as all other Lakes in the Ozarks, has water backed way up into the tributaries, and that’s where the bass will be found. Bass are drawn into those shallows in June, even in fairly clear water, and early in the morning and late in the evening, you can catch them there, around the green branches of flooded trees and heavy cover.

I first experienced that kind of fishing on Table Rock when I was just a teenager at School of the Ozarks College. The college owned land on Clevenger Cove, and there was an old aluminum boat there next to an old abandoned farmhouse. A friend and I would sleep in that old house on sleeping bags laid out on a canvas tarp. That way we could fish until dark, and again at the earliest light. We paddled that old boat around, no motor of course. Who needed one?

In June one year, when the water was high, we’d just slay the bass on topwater lures like those big, long Rapalas or Lucky 13’s, even Jitterbugs and large Hula-Poppers. As the day wore on, we would switch to a big spinner bait and fish it over the top of flooded briar patches, and watch bass come up out of that brush and get it.

The fish would be at various depths, but always around that green vegetation submerged by the high water. One morning in June, with mist rising from the water before sunrise, I made the mistake of a long cast with a topwater Rapala, letting it settle on the surface in the very tip of the cove, over submerged greenbrier bushes. I made it look like a crippled minnow and a huge bass was convinced that was exactly what it was. He apparently was hungry, or had something against crippled minnows. He took it with a great deal of aggressiveness, wallowing a bit on the surface, and I got a good look at him even at the distance I had cast. He was at least seven pounds in weight, maybe better, and I was using old tackle that couldn’t overcome his ambition to take that lure into the brambles. The struggle was great, but short, and I lost the lure. I could do without the bass, but it was a time of my life when topwater lures were treasures.

Years later, I had good luck on Truman lake when it was high, doing the same kind of fishing in June with a spinner bait over flooded brush. And using a Zara Spook on Bull Shoals around flooded green vegetation, I got the best of some awfully big bass late and early on June days gone by. But the best such topwater fishing I have ever enjoyed was on Millwood Lake, fishing in a jungle of flooded brush way back in the woods with a fellow named Floyd Mabry, who worked for Bomber Lure Company. Those bass weren’t huge, most ranged between two and four pounds, but there were lots of them. He was showing me a new topwater lure that Bomber was making with propellers, and I can’t even remember what it was. But it worked. It was the last time I fished Millwood, way down in the southwest corner of Arkansas, and I have wanted to go back every year when early summer rolls around. If only I could afford the gas!

If you like to catch bass, I suggest you find a flooded cove in your favorite lake, and try to fish around a mixture of water and green leaves, sometime just after first light or just before it gets dark. Use a big spinnerbait close to the surface, or a big topwater lure that kicks up a ruckus to attract bass. Actually, a big long Rapala wouldn’t be a bad choice either. But have a strong rod, and heavy line!

I am sending a letter this week to the Director of the Missouri Department of Conservation, asking him to explain the department’s connections with a Kentucky organization known as the Appalachian Wildlife Federation. Last fall, the MDC got 50,000 dollars from them, and turned over to them the information on tens of thousands of hunting license holders like you and me. I resent the fact that my name, address and social security number was given to any private group.

Thousands of you, like me, were sent, via U.S. mail, a package touting a big drawing for which about 16 high-powered rifles and several expensive big game hunts would be awarded. One of those hunts was hailed as a Missourian elk hunt in Kentucky; another was a big game hunt in Canada. All you had to do was send them 25 dollars per ticket, and they enclosed several. If you sent the Appalachian Wildlife Fund the money and the tickets, you’d be included in the drawing. Who knows how many Missourians sent them money for those tickets. I didn’t.

Suspicious of this whole thing, I called the only name given for the Appalachian Wildlife Fund. His name was David Ledford, in Kentucky, though recipients of the tickets were asked to send their money to an Ohio address. I asked Mr. Ledford if he would give me the name and address of the Missourians who won those expensive hunting trips and the 16 high-powered rifles. He hung up on me!

I will ask the Director of the Missouri Department of Conservation to disclose what kind of relationship the MDC has with Mr. Ledford’s group, and if they (the MDC) can tell me who won all those expensive rifles and trips. I am figuring that I won’t get the names, and if I don’t, I am going to wonder if the whole thing was a scam. I will pass on to readers what I find out. In the meantime, maybe there is a reader somewhere who sent in payment to the Appalachian Wildlife Fund for the chance to win something. If you did, let me know what information you received in return about the drawing.

I will say this again; for this type of thing, and many other things the MDC has done, an investigation should be conducted of that agency by our state’s attorney general. There isn’t room to detail all of it here, but in future columns I hope to relate some of what I have been told by MDC employees who want to see such an investigation regarding department spending they believe to be illegal. When this comes from within the department itself, it needs to be looked into. No news media in the state seems willing to go against this powerful agency, and they are the only agency in our state whose spending cannot be tracked. It is simply unbelievable that we have come to this.

My website is www.larrydablemontoutdoors.blogspot.com, E-mail me at lightninridge@windstream.net, or write to me at Box 22, Bolivar, Mo. 65613