TJM1455

I posted some questions some months ago prior to leading some scouts on a Current River trip in June. http://ozarkanglers.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=28394 We got some great fishing advice. Most of the fishing we did was at Montauk but no luck. Pretty frustrating to see those things stacked up and have them ignore everything you throw at them. Maybe next time. We had a great trip and I just wanted to say thanks to the folks on this forum. Check out our 2011 trip video. http://dgtroop57.org/activities.htm The hi res version takes about 12 minutes to load but looks great. Sorry for the delayed report. Got home from trip and a few days later had a tornado go right through my yard. Cat 1, some damage, but no injuries. Power was out for two days. Very fortunate. Two weeks later a storm comes through and power goes out for 4 days. At least I still had the camping gear ready and again, no injuries. Thanks again for the great advice. TM

We had our last bit of training last night other than swim tests. A scout asks me, "can I bring a machete?" I quickly thought about A. Agnew's post. I asked "for what?" and he said, "to cut fire wood" My co-leader said, "you can bring one as long as it is BSA approved. And as there are no BSA approved machetes, no you can't bring one" Our Troop Scout Master is a savant at identfying banned objects. At summer camp the Game Boys and the like stay in the cars. He can spot make and model under a sweatshirt from 100 feet.

Thanks much for all the replies! First, trust me when I say that this group has a high level of respect for the river. The troop has been doing this trip for a number of years and the first guy to lead it realy instilled a high level of "leave no trace" philosophy. We also make a point to have the scouts clean up each camp and landing site to where it is better than when we arrived. I also don't tollerate any of conduct you might have seen from others although some boys seem to have a tendency to catch the occasional frog, snake, or lizzard. One accident or injury from something like that completely ruins the experience. I'm not a 'fun dad' or 'fun leader'. But at the end of the trip, fun will be had. We told the boys a trip to the hospital begins in a canoe. I really apprecaite the lure suggestions espcially pinching down barbs or going barbless. Hook accidents are no fun and it makes catch and release much more doable. I plan to discourage fishing from the canoe early on as the river requires a bit more attention early. Further down stream I think I can let them fish while on the water. Last year was my first trip on this river. I've done numerous canoe trips over the years but mostly in Wisconsin and Canada Boundary Waters. I had an inaccurate image of Missouri Rivers as slow, warm, amnd muddy. I had no idea there streams like this in Missouri. You have a great resource! Check out our info from last year on our troop web site http://dgtroop57.org/activities.htm look at the video under Summer High Adventure 2010 thanks again for the help.

I'm leading a group of Boy Scouts down the Current River in early June. Baptist Camp or Cedar Grove to Two Rivers or Owls Bend doing primitive gravel bar camping along the way. I helped with this last year and we had little fishing luck. We had one trout jump into a canoe which we released. We could not call it catch and release because we were not actively trying to catch anything at that time. I've read some posts here stating that as you get downstream of Cedar Grove the fishing transitions from trout to small mouth. These kids are not fly fishing. Some might bring a spining or casting rod. Any suggestions on lure advice here? Spinners or crank baits? They'd probably be fishing from shore so advice on dealing with the current flow would also help. Better time of day? thanks