Ted Shanks

[carptracker]

I fished Ted Shanks on Monday. In about two hours, got 18 really big common carp, lord knows how many buffalo, one smallish longnose gar, a drum, several silver carp, and 7 big bigheads. Biggest two bigheads were males and they were both under 40 pounds, but not by much. If they had been females they would have been well over 40. The females we caught were packed with eggs.

This was all in a net of course. The work god has declared that Carptracker will get no bowfishing in any time soon. But I have been salivating over getting up there to bowfish. Unlike the river Asian carp, these Asian carp are fat and sassy. A bighead from here will weigh double what one of the same length would weigh on the Missouri this year.

[HNI_Christine]

Did you net a section of theMississippi River or is there some backwater you can get a boat into there? (hard to tell from the satellite photo)

How was the water clarity?

Thanks!

[carptracker]

We fished Horseshoe lake. There is a boat ramp on the southwest end, kind of close to the boat ramp to the salt, just a little to the North and east of the Salt River ramp. Water clarity in the river is miserable right now, but we were not fishing the river. Water clarity in Horseshoe was mediocre - lots of greenish, dark water, but not muddy, just lots of plankton. I'm not sure how you would find the bigheads in there. They'd be kind of spread out. I recommend looking for the deepest water and going slow or just drifting, at night. Least that's what I would try. But I'm not an expert at finding them at night. The bighead numbers in these wetlands are not high - but the size is definately way up. We did not get any under 25 pounds. There were a medium to small number of really small silver carp, and a few nice silvers in the 15 pound range. Lots of mediocre buffalo. LOTS.

[carptracker]

By the way, lots of bowfin in Ted Shanks too, and an incredible number of goldfish.