fishinwrench

Dennis, were you island hopping last Friday ? I thought I saw your truck.

Does this mean I won't get a "E78 Sinister Stone" ? I'll tye mine on Justin Allen's hooks...just so everyone can sample them Sorry Justin, but darn...

Easy Now ! I'll be sending SJW's if it gets much bigger

Unless they deviate from the norm, whatever trout are in the river now is all there's gonna be until Feb.- March. They are running a bit small now (too small to eat) but that's a good thing. They'll be alot more sporty and stand a chance at getting BIG if they do their growing up in the river. I haven't fished the Barclay area all year, I need to get down there.

Sup Homey ?! Just stirrin' it. WTH you been ?

Yep, my daughter goes to a lake area high school...nobody else she knows at school fishes or hunts. Who ever heard of a kid raised on a lake...that doesn't fish ? They all swim real well though, at least that's a plus.

The allure of easy money will continue to spawn bad decisions The vessel must be grossly underpowered.

That was good, well put together. The transitions are really cool, love the zoom and fade thing.

Turned over a few rocks Friday. Lots of "life" down there.... clinger mayfly Golden stonefly and caddis cases Big caddis larva or cranefly larva ? (not sure...anyone know?) variety of little mayflys and aquatic worms (stonefly food !) I saw a few big black stoneflys also but it's hard to catch them without a net, they jump ship pretty quick as soon as you pick up the rock. The smaller golden stones were pretty thick, I could have filled a bucket with them if I'd kept at it very long.

9/10 You really know trout! We're guessing you can lay down a pinpoint 40' cast in a stiff wind and tie a blood knot with your eyes closed. In fact, we think it's safe to say... You DO Know Trout — and you've been entered in our grand prize drawing to win a Dream Fishing Trip and fly fishing gear package from Orvis! I missed the stupid Alaskan salmon question. I bet Phil and Babler could ace it.

Dude that was top notch ! You got it goin' on so tough it ain't even funny, and that boy of yours...Total fishing machine in the making, and a true character !

ok

Justin, seriously ? Do I need to come down there and hand you your butt on your own river..... without a bobber And I bet you have preferred stretches there, and would be disappointed enough to bitch about it on here if they installed an outflow pipe in the middle of it.

Does anyone have a theme in mind, or is it just totally open ?

Now would I do that ? The reason I started the thread was because when I saw it I said "Aww WTF, what a darn shame", and I knew that there's some guys out there that would feel likewise. I don't fish the park much anymore, matter of fact last Sunday was the first time I'd fished it in over a year, but I have always used that stretch to learn or perfect techniques. Trout park fish bite just like wild'er trout so a little practice in the park where you're likely to get alot of bites is excellent sparring practice for learning to detect strikes, experimenting with weight placement, setting the hook, and testing all types of flys that also work elsewhere. The High Bank is the only stretch along the Spring branch where you have complex currents and actual "lies" where fish hold in current seams and overhanging branches demand some casting skills. It is a good place to learn, and then later practice "real flyfishing". Plus, the weedbeds there never got trampled through so they hosted excellent hatches of baetis mayflys, midges, and little brown caddis at certain times...and YES the fish get darn selective to them. The weedbeds are also loaded with scuds at times and that section never sees the weed cutting boat. Another plus to the High Bank was that (if you kept an eye out for copperheads, and hikers on the trail) you could duck into the woods on the river-right and take a leak without having to stop fishing completely and hike a darn 1/4 mile. So, when I said that the HB was the only "natural" stretch of the Spring creek.... those are the type of things I was referring to. For myself and a bunch of others it holds some fine memories and it was always comforting to know that it was there. I taught my oldest kid how to flyfish there and I have another one coming of age in a few years that I hoped to be able to do the same. Big blue plastic tubes spewing hatchery overflow, concrete stairs, walkways and pruned trees take alot more away from that stretch than it adds. Especially since the only plus to that disgusting modification is cheaper trout for the city mudholes during the Winter.

It certainly isn't. Nice job, Brother. I love it !

So according to that article this is all about stocking the St.Louis area mud puddles during Winter. No mention at all of improving the Niangua fishery management. Are you St.Louisans getting the message ? "Please don't come HERE, we'll just bring the trout to YOU !" They could have done this at Meramec Springs... since it's closer and all. I'm sure the James foundation could use a financial boost.

Awesome ! Keep us updated on the progress, I love to see a boat being built. I believe I'd tweek the plans a little and make the hull width about 40" in the center, if it were me. Do the plans give an idea of the weight of the finished boat ? I've thought about building one too, but was afraid it would be a beast in the weight department. Are you planning to fiberglass the hull ?

I wonder what they plan to do with all the additional trout that the newly expanded hatchery will surely produce ? I hope that this "new and improved" hatchery operation will result in much improved management of the fishery BELOW bennett. Because if it doesn't I consider the whole thing a disgusting waste of time and money, over and above the undesirable altering of a section of the spring branch that should have been left alone. I mean after all...how many more fish could they realistically put into the spring branch for Christ sake ?

If you were down there recently it is where the big trac-hoe, bobcats and big mounds of dirt were setting.

The gravel shoal on the far bank at the mouth of the little dry branch, basically the beginning of bluff hole

Yep, they are killing it. Big ugly bright blue tubes that will puke constant hatchery overflow are being placed right where the good celeryfly and caddis hatches used to occur. They are turning what has always been the best (most natural) stretch of the whole spring branch into yet another perch for the John Deere tyin' bobber floating outlet buzzards From the looks of things I'd say a set of concrete stairs are in the works also... Somebody in charge of hatchery personel obviously hired a city boy that doesn't fish to design the "improvements". What a drag ! If you loved the Highbank for what it once was, you'd better fish her quick, one last time, and save your memories. Progress sucks !

Not to a 17 y/o fishinwrench it wasn't. Freddie Kruger type movies were a new thing at that time, and there were all kinds of stories and urban legends going around... I thought there was a for real freak in the woods.... a rich one ! Our real motive was to conquer the madman and snarf up all the loot that might be in the woods Talk about how times have changed.... We divised the mission the night before, so my truck sat unlocked in the school parking lot with two shotguns in the rear window, boxes of buckshot in the seat, and a revolver in the glove box...and nobody thought anything of it. If some 17 y/o boys did that NOW there would be a statewide school lockdown and SWAT teams in the hallways.

LOL One I'll never forget was on Tavern creek, there was "something" across stream and down aways that from where I was standing looked like a human head, but there was a deep hole between me and "it" so I couldn't cross. I kept looking over there as I worked my way down to a point straight across from it and the closer I got the more it looked like what I was afraid it was. To make a long story short it turned out to be a dead possum in a trap, but I'll never forget that sick feeling I had up until I figured out what it was for sure. Major adreneline rush! Back when I was a teenager (17) I was squirrel hunting in a woodlot behind an old school house site way out in the sticks in Audrain county and I came across a note tied to a tree along a half-butt trail, handwritten in pencil, it said "He is Coming". A little further down the trail another note.... "Are you ready?". I'm looking around and kinda starting to freak out because it was late in the evening, I was alone, armed only with a Ruger 10/22, and a long way from my truck. As I'm scanning the visable area in total defense mode I see what looks like a dollar bill up the trail ahead of me, I get a little closer and I see it is a 20 ! I was like "oh hell no, this is a friggin' trap noway am I walking over to snatch that 20", and I double-timed it back to the truck, squirreless, and GTH outa there. The next day after school I took a buddy and my girlfriend with me to go see WTF was the deal, we armed ourselves to the teeth (12 guages loaded with 3" #4B goose loads, handguns, and binoculars) and headed straight for where the Twenty dollar bill was. When we got within sight of it we started studying the ground and the surrounding trees with binoculars looking for some kind of trap or something, visions of some PTSD Nam vet materializing out of a tree trunk with a machette had my heart pumping like crazy and my girlfriend was about to piss herself. My buddy rigged a stick, creeped over and knocked the 20.00 bill off the branch while I "stood guard" ready to open a hole in center of mass, of anything that moved. He raked the 20 over to him, picked it up and saw that it was made on a copier and spray painted green (colored copiers were unheard of then), the back of it said... "Repent your sins, prepare for Jesus", and was ink stamped with the address of a little country church down the road a few miles. Later we learned that the preacher liked to "take walks". I was a pretty level headed teenager but for some reason that pissed me off. The thought of that old fart prowling around the woods randomly planting little notes to try and fill the seats of his church just seemed totally insane to us. So we went to his sermon the following Sunday (which actually was pretty good) and when they passed the plate I fed it the phoney 20, but then my girlfriend snatched it back out of there. On the way out of the church everyone looked at my girlfriend like she was a freakin' leper cuz they thought she took money out of the plate I'm going to hell for that... I just know it

Sounds like a great deal. How soon could we expect to recieve it after payment ?