Heads or Tails?

Same legendary river. Same part of Arkansas and Ozark topography. But that's where the similarities end. The Beaver Lake tailwater, where Nathaniel and I fished yesterday with Brad Wiegmann, stays 51 degrees and super clear, and most fish you'll lock horns with will be rainbow or brown trout. The headwaters, where we launched Wiegmann's kayaks this morning, was more then 15 degrees warmer than the lake's tailwater and sort of a dark green with modest visibility. White bass are the main attraction in this section during the spring, but the walleyes are also up the river, and in truth any given cast could produce a variety of species, including stripers, smallmouths, spots and more.

One other thing these two sections of the upper White River have in common is that they are really fun to fish out of kayaks and by wading. If fact, it's hard for me to imagine a more fun way to fish on a beautiful spring day.

The highlight of the fish catching was a big walleye that took Brad's YUM F2 Walleye Grub in the uppermost pool that we fished this morning. Nathaniel had the hot hand when it came to catching white bass. He tied on an XCalibur Xcs Square Lip before we launched this morning and never had reason to change lures.