The lake level is 559.93 and has dropped a little over 3-inches in the last 24-hours. It has taken four days to drop the last foot. It is dry and we are needing rain again. Patton from Scuba Doo Dive shop put in some new dock cables for me yesterday and did a great job. If anybody needs some long steel cables in pretty good shape give me a call and you can have them. I replaced with stainess steel. We continue the policy of continued improvement here at Blackburns. People ask "at your prices how are you not full all of the time"? I answer "we mostly are". Others prefer to have high prices and stay nearly empty on the off season. Blackburns prefer to have low prices and stay nearly full. My background taught me to sell until you are turning people away and then raise prices not raise prices until the business goes away. I had one person tell me his business was down 10% last year so he raised prices 10% to make up for it. That is not our policy. We have mostly repeat customes and they are our friends and we do not want to charge them too much. It is hard to have friends when they are overcharged. Blackburns continues to be the best value in the Ozarks and we know that. It is not because of any reduction in quality. We have everything here. Some smaller places with just a few cabins have to charge a lot in order to make a living or work outside the resort. We do not. We have great employees and have to keep them busy all year and not lose them in the off season and start all over each year. It works for us and allows us to make things better. We are open all year and stay busy through November and then slows down but never stops. People come here for jobs, looking for real estate, waiting for deals to close, building a house, visiting relatives, fall foliage, fishing and just hanging out and most do not want to stay in motels and like the peace and quiet of our 28-acres in the country but very close to town, dining and shopping. They like to sit on their covered porch and watch the wildlife and birds in our bird sanctuary and fish off our dock or rent a boat. Fishing is excellent in the winter. As far as fishing goes it has not changed much. The lake is dropping, the moon is waning, the surface water is still 86-87 and is pretty clear for this time of year. Spoon those 30-ft. brush piles and work the bank in the evening with soft plastics. Bait fish are everywhere near the bank and big bass are coming in to feed on them. Early morning fishing is the best from about 6-10 AM. The walleye and crappie that I am catching have been in the same places for several weeks and have not moved and are staying where the oxygen is good near the thermocline where they can move into cooler water. Fish are not roaming and you can fish out a good brush pile if you keep pounding it. Catch a couple and leave some for seed. Smaller stripers are being caught trolling along with a few hybrids and white bass but it is hard to troll brush. I have never had so many both game fish and bait fish under my dock before. I feed them and the turtles and they are telling all of their friends.
