Al Agnew

I can see where OTF is coming from. I think there are two separate mindsets among anglers. To some, the fish is simply a goal, a way of keeping score. It's a mindset that shows up most significantly in big time tournaments where the fish IS a score. Adding up points is the important thing, the fish and its well-being is secondary at best. That's why you see all the tournament guys hoisting the fish into their boats and letting them flop around on the carpeted deck or floor, which we all know can't be real good for their slime coat--and these fish ARE supposed to be released. But it's the quickest and surest (for fish below a certain size) way of securing those points. It's also been popularized the most by a few self-appointed tournament jerks like Iaconelli or however you spell his name, which may be where the guys that OTF talked about got their idea of how to act when you catch a good fish. But there's a difference between treating the fish with the kind of respect that tries insure it is healthy when released (assuming it WILL be released), and the kind of respect that makes catching and releasing one a "dignified" act. The first should be a necessary part of catch and release angling, the second is optional. The other mindset is one more of reverence for the fish and the resource. It's probably been popularized the most by the plethora of fly fishing books that make the act of fishing and the act of catching a fish a "sacred" experience, not to be trivialized by "unseemly" behavior. The fish is not a score, it's an object almost of worship. Maybe the best thing about this mindset is that it does go a long way to insure that the fish is handled correctly when caught and released. The worst thing is that it becomes a form of snobbery. Personally, I lean a bit toward the second mindset but I also realize that it's all in my mind; the fish doesn't care that it's an object of reverence. But mainly, I try to be mindful of how I handle the fish, and mindful of how fortunate I am to be able to be on the river and fishing. Every time I begin a float trip, I push the canoe off, climb in, and if the current let's me, I pause with the paddle across my knees and take a deep breath and close my eyes for a minute and simply appreciate--no, "appreciate" is not a strong enough word--the fact that I'm on the river once more. When I catch a nice smallmouth, I take just a second to admire it and look at its color and any interesting scars or marks before releasing it, and I'm very careful about the way I handle the fish, not bending its lower jaw too far, etc. I don't whoop and holler even if it's a really big one. If I'm near another angler, I tend to go even calmer, probably because I want the other guy to think I do this all the time! As far as photographing, I will often lay the fish on gravel in an inch or so of water, so that the gravel is wet and somewhat slimy. I will sometimes lay it on WET grass or leaves. I don't want to lay it in mud, sand, or dirt, and I don't lay it on anything dry. When in my boat, I'll lay it on the front edge of the aluminum deck where I have a ruler, but I splash the aluminum to make it wet, and I don't do this on warm, sunny days where the deck is probably going to be hot. Since I use the boat mostly in cooler weather anyway, this is seldom a consideration.

Just one caution...there are several pools in that stretch that are wide and smooth and look plenty deep enough, but have scattered boulders out in the middle that at normal levels may be shallow enough to hit. Since it looks like smooth running and you'll probably be moving fast in such stretches, it wouldn't be pleasant to hit one. The water is slow enough that the boulders often don't form swirls on the surface, especially if there's a wind and chop on the water. You really need to be able to see well into the water as you're running. In general that section is runnable up to the mouth of Big Piney, something like nine miles above Jerome. Above the Piney, it gets narrower and much trickier.

It isn't quite as rosy here or in Montana as it seems, either. The property rights zealots are just going at it differently. In Montana, whenever a bridge needs to be replaced, if there is an influential landowner somewhere nearby on the stream, they make sure that when the new bridge is built, there is no place at all to park a vehicle in order to use it for access. So in effect they are gradually closing off sections of streams to the public by default. In Missouri, more and more we are seeing the same thing. Also, the highway departments themselves are not friendly to river access. They don't want the hassle of parking along the road shoulder or under the bridge. And local and county police don't want it either, because they don't want to have to deal with parties and drug use and trash dumping. There's a Finley Creek thread right now about closing off the Hwy. 160 bridge. When I drove around the Springfield area earlier this year I was dismayed at the lack of access at bridges. So while we all like the MDC accesses that we've gained in the last few decades, we're actually seeing a net loss of access to Missouri streams. It's often just one more instance of money talking. It's getting harder and harder to access private land for hunting by asking permission, because more and more of it is being leased to groups of more affluent hunters. And more and more people are buying up land along rivers and wanting to keep the public off "their" river any way they can. I fear for the rights of the public to use the rivers sometime in the future. And don't get me started on the whole closing off of traditional accesses because of too much partying and trash. It is the JOB of the law enforcement agencies to police such places, not to close them to everybody because of the actions of a few.

I too would think the gravel in the stomach is simply extraneous material picked up while eating crayfish and other bottom organisms. If you ever watch a good sized smallmouth pick a crawdad off the bottom, the suction when they take it is very strong and violent, and it is easy to see that they could easily suck up a lot of extra material, some of which would find its way into their stomach. Probably the smaller the critter is that they are eating, the more likely it would be to engulf more than just the critter. They don't always take something this way, however. With my homemade crankbait, which has a skirt on the belly hook, even good sized smallies often take ONLY the skirt. A long time ago I watched some video of largemouth striking regular crankbaits when the baits were running above them. They often swam up under the bait and very delicately snapped the swinging belly treble. I believe that for some reason, something hanging off the belly actually is an attraction, and adding some extra attraction to it makes it better. There are still a lot of mysteries about winter smallmouth. For instance, while on some streams it is possible to find some pretty large concentrations of fish in the winter, it still doesn't seem like we are finding ALL the fish that are there in the summer. In warm weather, bass are widespread over the stream and there are a lot of them, especially smaller fish. You never seem to find the same number of fish, and especially those smaller ones, in the winter. And on some streams, finding any fish at all in the winter is difficult. On upper Big River, where I know there are excellent numbers of smallies in the summer, I've never figured out how to find and catch them consistently in the winter. In one seven mile float where 50 to 75 fish days are pretty common for me in the summer, the number of decent wintering pools is fairly limited, so you'd think that all those fish would gravitate into those few good pools. But the pools always seem to have one little school of fish each, maybe a half dozen or so, and that's it. And sometimes they seem completely devoid of bass. I've floated this river a lot when it is extremely clear and you can see nearly all the bottom in the winter, and the fish simply aren't visible at all. I now believe that on a lot of smaller, clearer, less spring fed streams, the smallmouth simply find places where they can get completely out of sight under big log jams, overhanging banks, big boulders, and they almost hibernate and almost never come out and get active during the day. But on larger and somewhat murkier streams like the Meramec and Gasconade, or in places where they have a thermal refuge (a good sized spring), SOME of the fish seem to stay more active in the winter. Maybe some don't. Maybe...there are differences in individual fish, that make some stay more active in cold water. Maybe the bigger fishes' metabolism allows them to stay more active. Maybe smallies that stay somewhat active in the winter eat more and grow bigger than those who don't. It is also a bit of a mystery just what they do eat during the winter. Food is a lot scarcer then, especially bottom organisms. Minnows and other baitfish probably make up a lot larger proportion of their diet in cold water. Still, a bass is always a bass. To the angler, I don't really think it matters much what the bass are eating, because if they are active, their predatory instinct will make them take lures that look alive and vulnerable. It's just that what looks vulnerable in the winter is different from what looks vulnerable in the summer. While they CAN move fairly fast in cold water, they don't really want to. Nor do they want to come up into shallow water, or high in the water column, where they can be seen easily. I think that security becomes an over-riding concern in winter-time bass. They seem to instinctively know that they are slower and more vulnerable to predators, so they tend to stay in water deep enough that they can't easily be seen--or if the water is really clear, they stay on the bottom up against and under cover.

Al, like you I've fished thse streams for many years, and in the mid 70's we started fishing the Meramec with Arkie jigs with a #11 porkfrog. The bass had never seen anything like them. I would just take two different baits to the river, one 1/4 oz. jig and 3/8 oz. jig. I believe that many days we released over a 100 good smallies. In the early '80's just about the time the river accesses became more numerous along with the advent of jetboats, I began to take lots of big bass with Spook type baits. Didn't like their poor action, so started manufacturing my own. It was common to see as many as four good smallies chase that bait back to the boat. Those were rip roarin' days. Maybe my skill level has gotten better, and I have much more time to winter fish, thus the greater number of big fish have been taken the last fe years. Most folks now release their bass, so that's good, but a few lawbreaking giggers have a way of decreasing our lunker potential as you have written about previously. Also, you have to take the blame for this Guru name deal. I think it was you that started this, and others picked up on it. Zipstick is really just plain ole Nick, and many anglers out there are as much as a guru as am I. Good luck at your seminar and let me know if you want to go north this summer.

I was in Dicks Sporting Goods in the West County Mall in St. Louis a couple days ago, and noted that they have two of the Old Town Discovery 119 solo canoes in stock. I know that at various times a couple of people here have been in the market for one, and don't remember if everybody who was interested found one. The Disco 119, while not the best solo fishing craft on the market, is WELL worth the $400 price tag. 12 feet long, weighs 40 some odd pounds, and the seat needs to be moved forward to make it feel more stable and track better. If you're a big person, say more than 220 pounds or so, it might be a little too small for you. But otherwise, if you're interested in a very serviceable solo canoe at a good price, you might check it out.

Actually, the Meramec WAS terrific fishing in the mid to late 1970s and early 1980s. This was pre-spotted bass, and pre-jetboats. The river got far less fishing pressure back then, although there were LOTS of rental aluminum canoes on it on weekends. The best stretches for big smallmouth then are now infested with spotted bass, and the advent of jetboats resulted in much greater fishing and gigging pressure. There was a period of time mostly throughout the 1990s when the fishing was pretty bad. In recent years it seems to have improved somewhat. One of the best single days during the summer that I ever had for big fish was on the Meramec below St. Clair. Bob Todd and I were floating and I needed a picture of myself with a big smallmouth for some PR for a fund-raising print I'd done for the old Smallmouth Inc. conservation organization. We fished all morning without even seeing a smallie over 12 inches. About 2 PM, three fourths of the way through the float, I finally hooked a big one, close to 20 inches, and got it to the canoe before losing it. I figured that was my only chance for the day and I'd blown it. But just a few casts later I hooked another one, which I boated. That was the beginning of a couple hours of amazing fishing that resulted in the two of us boating 8 smallies between 19 and 21 inches. To get an idea of what the whole river was like, my buddy Clyde and I did a 12 day float from Short Bend, the highest put-in in the MDC float book, to the old Times Beach Access, a total of 163 miles, back in 1982. It rained on us 8 out of the 12 days, and while the river never came up very much, it was too muddy to fish well between Maramec Spring and Steelville, and again below the mouth of the Bourbeuse. But on the days it was clear enough, we caught numerous smallies over 18 inches, with 2 over 21 inches and two more over 20. Fact is that I wasn't nearly as knowledgeable back then about catching big smallmouth, but on the Meramec I just about expected to catch at least one or two over 18 inches every time I got on the river.

Hey, I am against health care for spotted bass. I'm always SO misunderstood. I don't hate spotted bass. I just hate them invading my favorite rivers. I love the little critters in the places where they belong. And yes, I HAVE painted spotted bass, including a BPS cover a couple years ago. But that painting is definitely of a largemouth. Hope to see you all at the program!

Lot's of food for thought, Trav. Fishing is many things, but it is first of all finding fish. If you're not fishing where fish are, you absolutely, tee-totally won't catch fish. Sure, finding arches on your graph doesn't mean you'll catch those fish, or even if they are the right kind of fish. Finding neat pieces of structure and cover on your graph doesn't mean there are catchable fish there. But those things give you toehold, anyway. Finding fish is pretty simple on small bodies of water. Chances are that with any knowledge at all, you'll be fishing in the right places. But when it comes to bigger bodies of water, that ain't necessarily so, not only because of the area you have to evaluate, but also because the third dimension, depth, becomes so much more important as well. When I was a kid, pre-depth finder era (kinda like the Jurassic Era), my dad and I fished Wappapello Reservoir every weekend. From many years of being on the lake, learning from an angler who had many MORE years on the lake, "feeling" the bottom with deep-diving crankbaits and a 15 ft. cane pole, cruising the lake in the winter when the water level was quite low, even talking to even older old timers who had known the river valley before the lake was built, Dad knew the lake about as well as anybody. We knew where the river channel was, we knew where all the stump fields were, we even knew where a lot of individual stumps and logs and sunken duck blinds were. We could tell you how deep the water was within at least a foot or two at just about any spot on the lake. But knowing the lake that well HAD taken a lot of time and observation. And it was a shallow lake...the third dimension wasn't as crucial as it can be on deeper lakes. It was a whole lot easier to find a big cypress stump in 7 feet of water than it is to find a ledge with a sunken cedar tree on it in 30 feet of water. On the rare times when we traveled to a lake like Bull Shoals, we were almost clueless, and it was only because it was so difficult for ANYBODY to learn such lakes well that we still caught fish--there were simply more fish that were easier to catch back then. On Wappapello we were fish gods, probably catching as many or more big bass as anybody else on the lake. Then, depth finders appeared on the scene and bass fishing got a lot more popular. We got a depth finder. It helped us stay on the edge of the river channel fishing those good stumps in open water a little better, but that's about it. But now we were seeing a lot of other guys fishing the stumps that few but us had known about before. Those danged depth finders were allowing them to find spots that had once been exclusively ours. And it's no coincidence that the fishing rapidly got tougher for us--while probably getting easier for the newbies. If there is one constant in fishing, it is that the more fishing pressure there is, especially effective fishing pressure, the harder it becomes to catch fish, whether that's because there are fewer fish or because the existing fish get more sophisticated. So...technology, while not guaranteeing success, is a great equalizer. It allows the angler who is less experienced on a particular body of water to find and catch fish quicker and easier, narrowing the difference between them and the guy who's spent a lifetime on the lake. The question is, is this entirely a good thing? Fishing has become almost like an arms race. The better the technology, the greater the numbers of anglers that are able to fish effectively. The more anglers fishing effectively, the more pressure is put on the fish and the tougher fishing gets. The tougher fishing gets, the more technology and/or knowledge it takes to catch fish. Back in those antediluvian times when we fished Wappapello, everybody caught some fish but we caught a LOT of them. There were simply more stupid fish back then and fewer good anglers to beat on them, so even though catch and release was practically unheard of, the fishing was good. Now, there are a lot more effective anglers, who are fishing for more sophisticated and probably less numerous fish and probably catching just about as many overall because their knowledge and technology is so much better. So it's hard to say if we're really better off. If we DON'T have the knowledge of specific waters and at least SOME of the technology that others have, we're probably a lot worse off. So, while we NEED some level of technology to catch a lot of fish from big, heavily pressured lakes, if the technology didn't exist we probably wouldn't need it nearly as much. And, at what point does the technology get so good that there is simply TOO much pressure put on the fish? We all want to catch fish every time we go out, but if everybody did catch them like that, how long would the resource last? At the very least, the better the technology gets, the more likely it is that more restrictions are put on keeping fish. But even if we made bass fishing purely catch and release in response to nearly foolproof technology, it would still mean tougher and tougher fishing due to the fact that some fish will always die after being caught, and the more times they are caught the more likely they are to eventually die from it. And, fish are just "intelligent" enough to learn from bad experiences, and the more times they are caught and released, the tougher they get to fool. So, as technology gets better and better, it gets more and more necessary to have it in order to catch fish, and the poor sucker who can't afford the technology catches fewer and fewer.

Yeah, you may be right. I haven't floated the upper section in several years. Floated Clabber Creek section two years ago, but it was in fairly low water. It didn't look any different then than the times before that I'd floated it in higher water, but with the high water the last year or so, I'm sure it could have changed considerably. The first couple times I floated it (back in the 70s ) it was rougher than the last time or two. Mainly, though, I'm just going on what Ozark streams like the Buffalo tend to be like. With the gradient of these streams and the character of the land through which they flow, it isn't easy for them to form a "semi-permanent" class 3. Lots of transient obstructions like log jams can make rapids into possible class 3s for a time, though. The reason the St. Francis has legitimate class 3s and 4s is because it has sections that drop more than 20 feet per mile along with granite boulder gardens and very sharp drops. The thing is, though, that it doesn't take a class 3 to be a dangerous rapid for the casual canoeist. I haven't done a lot of class 3 in a canoe, and don't really wish to do so. I did some of it back when I was young and dumb, floating tiny creeks in high water...enough that I think I figured out what I was doing, but not enough to be real confident about it.

Yeah, you can't fish for them at night during the spawning season (starting at the end of February) in Missouri, either, because they were easy to snag (and gig) when on the spawning riffles at night. The native Missouri walleye were river strain fish, and when the lakes were built they did well in the lakes but continued to run up the rivers to spawn. At various times northern lake strain walleye have been stocked in Ozark reservoirs, so some of the walleye in lakes like Ozark probably spawn in the lake, but there are still enough river strain genetics for a lot of them to run up the streams. In the unimpounded rivers like Current River, the native walleye begin spawning in late February, but a lot of the lake spawners are probably just now getting into it. I think it depends upon how high the rivers are above the lakes when the walleye make their move. If the rivers aren't very high, they probably move not much farther than the first good riffle they come to. But water levels seem to make riffles change characteristics, and a good spawning riffle at low water might not be good at higher water. And not all riffles are good spawning riffles at any time, so it's no wonder that the people who know where the good riffles are keep quiet about it. What I'd look for is a nice gravelly riffle with a good, deep pool just below. The walleye will spend the day in the pool, and move up into the riffle to spawn at night. Live bait works well in the pools, but minnow-shaped deep diving, suspending crankbaits are good, as are jigs tipped with minnows or with a curly tail grub. I'd think the soft plastic swimbaits would work well, too. Fish near the deepest parts of the pool.

As many here probably know, I make a number of my own river smallmouth lures. Perhaps the biggest reason I do so is because nobody commercially produces lures exactly like those I make. The first wooden lure I began making was based upon the old Midge-Oreno. I started making mine because the patent for the lure had changed hands, and the new company changed them to where they didn't work as well. And the available colors weren't any good, either. Later, I made them in different sizes, and finally figured out that it was possible to make them more simply by changing the shape of the front. But the reason I made them myself in the first place was because, with the addition of a skirt, they were one of the most effective river smallie lures I've ever used. At about the same time, I started re-painting Rapala floating minnows to match the colors of the minnows in local streams. As an artist, I was quite able and interested in reproducing the colors of minnows like bleeding shiners, stonerollers, and topminnows almost exactly, and I was convinced that such lures would be more effective. However, I rather quickly found out that they were NOT all that much more effective, and with the time it took me to paint them, it just wasn't worth it. Soon, another old lure that was always one of my all-time best smallie lures, the Shannon Twin Spin, disappeared from store shelves, so I started making my own. I started out by making a form and pouring the lead heads exactly the same shape as the Shannon, but later decided that I could buy painted spinnerbait heads and modify them a lot easier (and probably safer when you consider the health risks of pouring lead). After that, I began to come up with my own ideas for lures, and attempt to make them out of wood. I've made a lot of topwater lures over the years that worked well, and have had quite a few failures as well. My biggest failure is that I've never been able to come up with a deep-diving crankbait that will wobble like my homemade shallow crank when you attach a skirt. My latest success is a smaller version of the Rapala Subwalk, a subsurface, slow-sinking walk-the-dog lure. I started trying to make them because the Subwalk was just a little too big. Now...Rapala has come out with a smaller Subwalk this year--I haven't tried it yet to know whether it's as good as my homemade version. And at present, I'm also experimenting with walk-the-dog topwaters that I can work just under the surface like a wake bait. Oh, yeah, I also modify a lot of existing lures. I've modified Pop-Rs Zell Rowland style, added various skirts and dressings to lures, added weight to make floating lures suspend, etc. In fact...there are relatively few lures that I actually use right out of the box. I think at times this gives me a bit of an edge...and anyway, it's fun and satisfying to catch fish on your own ideas!

I've now owned three Toyota products, after buying exclusively "American"--Ford and GM--autos since 1970 or so. I've been lucky enough never to have had a problem with ANY of them, other than normal wear and tear. I was perfectly happy with every Ford and Chevy and GMC car, van, and truck I ever owned. The reason I first bought a Toyota Highlander Hybrid was because at the time it had more cargo room that the Ford Escape Hybrid, gas mileage was comparable, and there were statistically more mechanical problems with the Fords. The reason I bought the Prius was simply because of the gas mileage--no, not necessarily because I wanted to save money, just philosophically wanted to use as little gas as possible. The reason I just bought an new non-hybrid Highlander to replace the hybrid was because I'd had a good experience with the old one and knew that right now was a good time to beat up the Toyota dealership on the price! But I have to admit I wasn't as excited about buying it as I had been the old one, because in the meantime Toyota had gone a bit more toward the "American" route of making the vehicle bigger and heavier...meaning that now the hybrid's highway mileage is only about 1-2 mpg better than the non-hybrid. So, buying American didn't enter into any of those decisions. If it had, I still wouldn't have had a problem with buying the Toyota because of the fact that, like the "American" car companies, Toyota is a multinational corporation which also furnishes lots of very good jobs to American workers. As others have pointed out, maybe they aren't quite as good jobs as the American auto companies have traditionally furnished their employees, but those "legacy costs" are part of where the American companies have gotten into trouble. Give me a product that fits my needs, and I'll buy it happily from an American company...and be willing to pay a little more for it. But I will not settle for a product that is less than what I want or need.

Bobber, got to disagree with you...I've never seen Clabber Creek Shoal listed as class 3, and from the times I've floated it, I wouldn't consider it anything higher than class 2. Maybe in water two feet or more above normal it might be higher, but at that point you probably don't have a sneak route, either. I'd call it low class 2 at normal summer water levels. If you compare Ozark streams to "whitewater" streams in many areas of the country, what is considered class 2 is fairly rare in the Ozarks, and class 3 is even rarer. The Mulberry and Big Piney Creek have some legitimate class 3 rapids. And a lot of small creeks can be class 3 and maybe 4 when they are high enough to float. The Hailstone stretch of the Buffalo has a number of class 3 and maybe class 4 when it's really honking. In Missouri, the St. Francis is the only good sized stream that has legitimate class 3 rapids, and it can go up to class 5 in very high water. When it's flowing 25 feet above normal through Tieman Shut-ins, I'd say it's class 6...I've seen it at that level. But I've floated streams out West in rafts that were considered class 3, and they were an order of magnitude hairier than any rapid on the Buffalo from Ponca to the White River. I floated the John Day, a river of similar size to the Buffalo, through a section that had one listed class 3 rapid, in a one person inflatable kayak. That rapid was easily doable in the inflatable kayak, but it was considerably scarier than Clabber Creek. Of course, water levels have a great deal to do with it. And it's in some ways a subjective rating system. A lot of riffles on Ozark streams smooth out and are easy to run when the water is up 8 feet...but your margin for error is so much slimmer that they could still be rated pretty high. They might be easy to run, but if you make a mistake you are not real likely to survive it.

Yeah, if you want to see some of the sights you can do a one day hike and see the Goat Trail and Hemmed-in Hollow. I've done that hike several times, starting up at Center Point trail head on Hwy. 43, taking the side trail to Big Bluff, back to the main trail and on to Hemmed-in Hollow, then following the old river trail to Kyles Landing. It's about nine miles or so including the detour on the Goat Trail, and the great thing about it is that it's mostly downhill. The biggest problem is that you'll need to cross the river 4 times on the Old River Trail, and if the river is high that isn't possible. Otherwise, however, you can hire BOC or somebody else to run a shuttle for you from Center Point to Kyles just like you were doing a float trip. If the river is too high, you can go Center Point to Compton Trailhead and not have to cross the river, but it's a serious uphill at the end from Hemmed-in Hollow to Compton trail head. Then do two days farther down the river. I love the section from Woolem to Hwy. 65 a lot.

The thing is, the federal regulation that will possibly be advocated is mostly of off-shore species that aren't limited in range to one state. That's the reason it is being discussed. Fish in the Pacific Ocean or in the Great Lakes don't necessarily stay in the waters off one particular state. So as it stands now, the same fish are under two or more state regs that often conflict with each other, and that's what the task force is seeking to address. It's the height of ridiculousness to think that this will be extended to inland waters that are entirely within one state. It's often amazing how somebody can twist what is probably a good thing into a horror, by half-truths, suppositions, and innuendo. And it's usually somebody with a political ax to grind.

Well, actually there are a lot of Toyotas built in America by Americans...and as far as I know, zero Shimano reels built in America. I own a Prius. When this stuff first came to light, I went out on the interstate, floored the accelerator pedal, and while keeping it floored shifted the gear lever into neutral. It worked. Doesn't necessarily mean it would work if there is some sort of computer problem that is causing this unintended acceleration, but I have to think that if this was a really serious problem, there would have been a LOT more people coming forward and saying it happened to them...or a statistically significant number of high speed accidents involving Toyotas. A certain small percentage of all autos probably have these problems for one reason or another. By the way, though, jd...the Prius is actually a pretty zippy little car. In fact, we've driven ours a lot of highway miles and passed a lot of cars at 80 mph (when driving out west where the speed limit is 75) and I don't think I've ever had to floor the accelerator pedal to do so. Their screen that shows instant gas mileage at all times, if you watch it and watch how you drive, will make you have a lot lighter foot on the pedal! Only problem we've had with ours is when driving long distances, we don't have to stop and get gas for so long at a time that when we do stop, we're too stiff and sore from sitting too long. (It gets somewhere between 45 and 50 mpg on the highway.) One other thing about this issue...I listened to somebody on NPR the other day that said that the apparent risk of this happening is far, far less than the risk of encountering an impaired driver, a deer in the headlights at 70 mph on the interstate, a blow-out...and far, far less than just a stupid move while driving. Yet, we all think we're excellent drivers and that we have the smarts and reflexes to avoid most accidents, while we feel helpless in the face of a sudden mysterious mechanical problem. So we freak out about this unintended acceleration, and don't worry at all about all the things we are more likely to get in trouble with on the highway.

I don't think I would recommend putting in at Boxley. The Boxley to Ponca section is not as scenic as the section below Ponca, and it has more serious rapids. If you haven't canoed rapids before, and are planning on taking gear for overnight, the chances are very good that you'll dump and get your gear wet at best. Boxley to Ponca has a number of class 2 rapids and some that could be up to class 3 in higher water levels. The chances are good that the river will be fairly high in early April, and I have to tell you that I've floated Ozark rivers in canoes for well over 40 years, and I don't think I'd want to float that stretch with camping gear in the canoe. Ponca or Steel Creek is a much better put-in. The section from Ponca to Kyles has a few rapids that can be a problem for inexperienced canoeists, especially in higher water levels, but it's much friendlier to the novice to fast water than the stretch above. If the river is at an optimum level and you are prudent and don't hesitate to get out and walk the canoe if things look hairy, you should be able to handle that stretch. For two or three days, you can go from Ponca to Pruitt (a good two day float in good water) or Hasty (probably the best for three days, unless you plan on doing a lot of stopping and not much steady paddling). The park service does not recommend hiking the Goat Trail across Big Bluff, but in my opinion that's something you just have to do. You'll see what is probably the single best scenic view in the Ozarks. Just don't do it if you have a fear of heights, since you'll be hiking across the face of the bluff, 350 feet above the river, on a trail that is simply a ledge that is less than 4 feet wide in a few places. And Hemmed-in Hollow is also a must do. Only problem with doing those hikes as you float down the river is leaving your canoe full of gear unattended while you hike away from the river. Unless the water is really high (and probably unsafe to float), you'll find enough gravel bars to camp on that you won't need to use the developed campgrounds. But the campgrounds are okay, too.

So okay, let me get this straight. There have been no recommendations yet from this task force, let alone recommendations to ban sport fishing, let alone sport fishing in inland waterways which aren't even a part of what the task force is considering. Apparently the scary thing is that the task force hasn't specifically recognized the economic benefits of sport fishing, and supposedly is made up of people with close ties to "big green" whatever that is, but apparently "big green" is supported by groups who are opposed to fishing. So there is an awful lot of supposition and innuendo that Obama is going to rubber stamp whatever the task force says, and the task force is going to do something to limit sport fishing someplace or another...apparently someplace in the oceans, but maybe someplace in the Great Lakes. In my opinion, this is fear-mongering of the worst sort. There is, at present, ZERO concrete evidence that this thing will result in curtailment of sport fishing in any sort of widespread basis. Chances are that sport fishing COULD be curtailed in some specific spawning areas in coastal waters...maybe. But this article, now quoted from two different websites so far, has ZERO facts, just a lot of supposition. Does it bear watching? Of course. But it would be political suicide for anyone in national public office to all of a sudden sign off on any kind of major ban of sport fishing. This sounds to me like somebody wanting to make political hay and trying to rouse the rabble. I'd say we should wait for some facts and concrete recommendations and actions before we go off the deep end.

Walleye in the Meramec should be spawning or getting ready to spawn right now, and I believe night fishing for them is illegal from March to May. This is mainly because in the past, people were able to locate them on the spawning riffles at night and snag them (as well as gigging them). The Meramec doesn't have a huge population, so they may not be easy to find. What I'd look for is a gravelly riffle area, then go downstream to the nearest deeper pool. If it's a spawning riffle, the fish will be somewhere in that pool during the day. Occasionally they can be found just below the mill dams on Big River at this time of year, but it seems to be a hit or miss thing.

Look guys, it's going to take a concerted genetic study to determine everything we need to know about the smallmouth of the Ozarks. And it's only been in the last decade or two that an in-depth genetic study was even possible. But I think you can look at the same connections I talked about at length in all the spotted bass threads and get some idea of how the genetics WERE, before humans started messing around with them. The Neosho/Grand river system empties into the Arkansas River at the western edge of the Ozarks. Nearest watersheds to it as far as connections are the southern Arkansas Ozark streams that also run into the Arkansas, like the Mulberry and Big Piney. Everything else in the Ozarks runs into either the White (which empties into the Mississippi right around the mouth of the Arkansas), directly into the Mississippi, or into the Missouri River up in Missouri. Therefore, the Grand/Neosho river system is isolated slightly from the southern Ozark streams, more isolated from the White River system, more yet from streams running into the Mississippi, and the most isolated from streams running into the Missouri. This has been true for a LONG time, since the Ozarks have been in their present configuration for a very long time. So even though the Neosho/Grand streams have their headwaters very close to some Missouri River tribs (like the Sac and Pomme de Terre) and are also very close to some White River tribs (the James, Flat Creek, and upper White), their smallies should be genetically isolated from the smallies of those streams. So, as was pointed out by somebody above, the genetics of Neosho/Grand river system smallies should be different from those of White River fish, and more different yet from Mississippi and Missouri river tributary fish. Enough so to be a separate subspecies? That's always been the argument. I would think it's probable that the genetics are different, but it's a matter of degree. As for the rest of the smallies in the Ozarks, there may be more differences between Missouri River tributary fish and upper Mississippi tributary fish (these would include Niangua, Gasconade, and Meramec fish) as opposed to lower Mississippi and Arkansas river fish. Because as I pointed out in the spotted bass stuff, those big rivers likely weren't good connections back when the Missouri was spewing great amounts of silt into the Mississippi. I think it's possible that the smallies in the White River are quite different genetically than smallies in the Gasconade. The Missouri and upper Mississippi fish may be more closely related to northern smallies, and the others more closely related to Tennessee River smallies. Maybe. But apparently the genetics of ALL smallies in the Ozarks are different from those in other areas, because it appears the top end size of Ozark smallies is smaller than the top end size of Tennessee River smallies. Witness the fact that Missouri and Arkansas state records don't compare to the state records of states like Tennessee, Kentucky, etc. This could very well be because the genetics of ALL Ozark smallmouth are different from those others. The Neosho/Grand river system smallies are just the MOST different. Maybe this is why they seem to have the smallest top end size. Or maybe it's something else. Now...while there hasn't been any widespread stocking of smallmouth in the Ozarks for many years, there WAS a lot of indiscriminate stocking all over the Ozarks back in the early 1900s, mainly in the mistaken belief that it would augment the numbers of smallies in the various streams. That's where the genetics got somewhat messed up, probably. So...I think it's likely that SWMO smallies are genetically unique, but so are smallies in other river systems in the Ozarks, both from those in other regions and amongst themselves. The question is, is the difference in genetics enough to merit subspecies status, and special protection? I'm all for protection for smallmouth in the Grand/Neosho system while the studies are done to determine once and for all their genetic status. But eventually those studies WILL have to be done.

Geez, guys, I agree...just where the heck DO you stand in regards to regs for SWMO? Look, in an ideal world, EVERY section of every stream would have the regs that are optimum for that section. I'd be all for that. In fact, that's kind of what I proposed a while back, but others didn't agree, probably rightly, because it was seen as far too complicated for anglers to learn and agents to enforce. Like it or not, blanket regs with limited exceptions are ALWAYS going to be more appealing to the powers that be at MDC. That's reality. The Neosho smallie streams in that case would have to be some of the exceptions--in other words, special management areas. I have no problem with that. In fact, I'd certainly like to see special management areas on more SWMO streams. Did we make a mistake in not proposing them to MDC? Maybe. And if so, perhaps it's not too late to do so. Since we have some credibility with MDC and the regulations committee, I don't think it would be a big problem to broach the subject to them by correspondence. But like the others, I don't see the rationale behind opposing blanket regs in the meantime. Nor do I see ANYBODY bashing your wishes to preserve Neoshos. Sorry to shout, but JUST WHAT THE HECK DO YOU HAVE AGAINST THE 15/3 IDEA? And other than Chief not being able to post on the website without being a member, what the heck do you have against the SMA? And...just how do you propose to get anything done about your passion? Start your own organization? I'll be one of the first to join. But it makes absolutely no sense to me to attack the ONE existing organization in this state which stands to have your best interests in mind...if you'll just air them.

Okay, Chief, now I'm starting to get a little frustrated with your comments. First of all, we're mostly a St. Louis based organization at this time, partly because when we tried to organize in SWMO before, we couldn't make it last because the few passionate anglers who were willing to do the grunt work burned out because there weren't enough other anglers willing to come in and spell them. Exactly who's fault is that? Second, because we're based mainly on this side of the state, OF COURSE we don't know as much about SWMO streams. Third, we DO have a retired biologist on the committee who probably knows as much or more about the smallmouth fisheries in this state as anybody, and he thinks the proposals we put forth stand about as much chance of achieving better smallmouth fishing as anything we could do. Fourth, the rest of us, myself included, have spent enough time on the water on this side of the state, AND have read and studied the scientific literature enough to know what we're talking about as much as is possible for people who are not professionals. Fifth, we KNOW that our proposals are not the be-all and end-all of achieving maximum quality smallmouth fishing, but we believe, and apparently so do some of the folks at MDC, that they could be a major step in that direction. So, as has already been said, if you have ideas on what would work for the Neosho strain smallies and SWMO streams, we want to hear them. If you think MDC should be concentrating more effort on Neosho strain conservation, THEY need to hear it. Exactly how are you going to accomplish ANYTHING other than making people like me grumpy if you simply sit on the sidelines and boo all sides? You refuse to join us, then say we obviously don't care what you think. I for one would like to discuss with you ALL your thoughts on smallmouth conservation as it relates to the waters you know well. I think the more we ALL know about stream smallmouth fisheries in MO, the better. I will go back and read what you wrote in the other threads related to this, but I'd guess you probably have more to say. I'm listening.

Most good casting reels these days are pretty easy to learn to use. In my opinion, if you get one in the $100 range it's going to be a good one. Also in my opinion, the rod you match it with is often as important as the reel itself for the beginner. Lots of guys end up buying a medium-heavy or heavy action rod, which makes casting lures of 3/8 ounce or less pretty problematical unless you are an experienced caster. Unless you plan on using it for heavy lures, get a medium action rod of 6 or 6.5 feet, a reel in the $75-100 range, put on line no heavier than 14 pound test, and maybe find somebody who uses one to do the initial adjustments of the reel. When you put the line on, go out in your yard, tie the end of the line to something, and back off until you've got a bit more than a cast length of line out. Put a piece of electrical tape or something similar on the line still on the spool and reel the rest of the line back over it. When you practice and backlash, the backlash won't go past the tape and will be easy to get out. I taught my brother-in-law, who had never used anything but spincast reels, to cast a baitcaster in an hour or so.

Good points. However, I'm not sure that you can equate mutations in single cell organisms to the more complex mutations necessary to make a species like the carp able to adapt to a new habitat. Not saying it isn't possible, because that's what evolution is all about. Just that it isn't as likely to happen. Armadillos seem to be extending their range northward because of the exceptionally warm winters we've had since the mid-1980s (but I wonder how our more normal winters the last couple of years are affecting them). As for the bees, from what I understand they hybridized with the bees they encountered, and that was what made them gradually able to adapt to the cooler climate. I don't think there's anything the carp can hybridize with in the Great Lakes. However, I agree that it may not be worth the gamble, and the Asian carp are an ecological disaster in waters warm enough to support them. The ship canal should never have been built in the first place, since connecting formerly unconnected watersheds is never a good idea. Whether the carp end up being a problem in the Great Lakes or not, sooner or later there are going to be more adverse consequences to such connections.