To dig into more details, follow Water Management links on the Corps’ Little Rock District home page, www.swl-wc.usace.army.mil. You’ll find a page with today’s and yesterday’s generation information, including the amount of water released each hour expressed as cubic feet per second. Each generator averages 3,300 cfs at maximum output; divide the turbine release in cfs by 3,300 to get a sense of how many generators were operating.

The SWPA, which markets hydropower from Corps dams, provides the current day’s projected hydropower generation schedule and history for the last six days at www.swpa.gov. The site uses “BSD” to indicate Bull Shoals Dam. Tentative generation schedules are also available at 1-866-494-1993. These systems describe releases only for hydropower and don’t include Corps flood-control releases.

FISHING TECHNIQUES
Everyone can find a comfortable way to fish on the White. For example, low water with no more than two generators at work means ideal conditions for wading anglers using spinning gear or fly rods. In steady low water, boaters anchor upstream from holes and catch fish with corn, red worms and paste or pelleted baits, such as YUM TroutKrilla. Guides also use freshly caught baitfish from the river.

As more generators go on line, conditions get tougher for wading or shorebound anglers, but higher water means fewer obstacles for boaters. “Up to five generators is ideal for fishing jerkbaits, like a (Smithwick) Rogue, out of a boat for big brown trout,” said guide Donald Cranor of Gassville.

Marabou jigs alone or sweetened with a trailer such as a 3-inch YUM Dinger or Wooly Curltail are also effective in low to medium-high water. Boaters beware: You cannot safely anchor in rising water.

On bright days, Cranor and fellow Gassville guide Jon Miller recommend Rogues with a blue back, silver sides and orange belly, then switch to black-backed Rogues when clouds move in. Cast to cover along the banks with rapid, erratic retrieves. This heart-pounding style of fishing is very visual -- trout flash at your lures right up to the boat. Cranor recommends 6-pound-test, light green monofilament or clear fluorocarbon line on light spinning gear.

With seven or eight generators running, Miller resorts to heavy river rigs to bounce bait off the bottom as his boat drifts downstream. Tie a three-way swivel to your line; then, attach a bell sinker and short-shanked bait hook to the other eyes of the swivel. Worms, canned salmon eggs and sculpins are excellent baits in this situation. Crawfish are especially effective from May through the summer, when the crustaceans are most active in the river, Cranor said.

Fly-anglers fish high water from boats by lobbing weighted leaders to drift San Juan Worms or egg patterns under an indicator, Miller said. His sports also cast outsized streamers to the banks and aggressively strip them for a fly-fishing version of jerkbaiting.

FOR MORE INFORMATION
Book guide Donald Cranor at 1-866-789-6271, or check his Web site, www.whiterivertroutfishing.net. To schedule fishing dates with Jon Miller, call (870) 430-5177, or surf to www.whiteriver.net/jons/

The Wade Fisherman’s Pocket Guide to the White, North Fork and Spring Rivers, which includes tables for estimating rising water, is available from the North Arkansas Fly Fishers club; their URL is www. northarkansasflyfisher.org.

Every trout angler also needs the 2007 edition of the Trout Guidebook, available free of charge at AGFC offices and tackle dealers statewide. The agency also offers a free wading safety brochure.