tjm

Here the highest gravel bars have been dry for a just a few days, with no rain in over a week, still about double the flow I like this time of year. Like I said different drainage but get the same rains.

Scope. Yours isn't enough, and likely you need a chain added to your rode. Fore and aft fluke anchors on long rodes should hold any small craft like that. It's how ships are kept in place. If your rodes (anchor ropes) are less than ~5-7 times water depth away from boat , you aren't even anchored. The anchor holds best against a horizontal pull, vertical pull lifts and carries/drags the anchor. https://www.anchoring.com/blogs/anchoring/anchoring-your-boat-all-about-scope https://www.boatus.com/expert-advice/expert-advice-archive/2019/january/how-to-calculate-anchor-scope https://www.westmarine.com/WestAdvisor/How-To-Anchor-Securely#:~:text=Scope Scope is defined as a ratio of,power%2C and more scope is better than less. https://captainsword.com/how-much-scope-to-lay-at-anchor/ https://www.nauticed.org/sailing-blog/anchoringhow-much-chain-and-rope/ http://cruising.coastalboating.net/Seamanship/Anchoring/Rode/Anchor_Rode.html#:~:text=the angle the rode addresses the anchor is,the anchor and deck hardware in light winds.

Alrighty then. You can only get a change by changing. If you can't burn those bridges then you are stuck in that place and should make the best of it. As long as you can 'go back' you won't have to go forward. You are young and single and should have some dough in the bank to carry you past the first few weeks. Picture yourself just back from a 2 year stint in the draft and dumped loose in a strange faraway city with a couple hundred bucks, could you make it, or would you need that "go back" place? You can only become self reliant by doing it. Make a plan and escape. You've been given some great advice already about bankers, accountants, lawyers and technology degrees. The journey won't start though until you jump into the fire. First steps and all that. Personally, even if I were keeping that job I'd move off the farm and drive to work, make them pay enough more that I could afford a place of my own and be able to leave work at work. Furnished housing is what they used to call "the quarters". No privacy, no responsibility, no independence, no reason to look away from "the place" , or think about self improvement and always available right there.

You just didn't notice your halibut's taste, I ate that stuff most Fridays for 12-15 years, it always tasted the same til I put lemon or vinegar on it, then it tasted like fish washed in acid. It may be that different folks have differing levels of taste and smell, but all the fish and animals I've ever seen cooked tasted pretty much like they smelled when alive unless the flesh had rotted. The smell and taste becomes fainter with preparation and cooking but it still has the same chemistry, that gives it the same taste/smell triggers. Fish sticks and luncheon meats being exceptions. I will admit that I've never eaten much fried fish in the mid-south that tasted like anything but bread and grease with added "spices". Most people in Mid America don't like meat or fish unless it is drowned in flavor destroying sauces or rubs. Squeamish maybe? I don't know, but I do know that you can't cook a chicken in any manner that won't leave it with a wet feather smell/taste. The chemistry is there regardless of the sauce, it is what the flesh is made of.

Aha, I thought you were looking for new work, in my 72 years that has always meant leaving home. In fact the old folks had a saying when someone left the house, "Write when you find work, won't ya?" If you are stuck in a place, just look for local ads, I'm sorry I butted in.

You looked here ? https://jobs.mdc.mo.gov/ And followed all the links? what about this? https://jobs.mdc.mo.gov/job/Eminence-Equipment-Shop-Technician-MO-654669714/719643000/ Most guys start hourly as - https://mdc12.mdc.mo.gov/applications/recruitment/Recruitment.aspx?strRoute=x/

They may not taste like salmon, but do they taste like more like spinach or fish? Of those three, I've only eaten halibut and it was like eating fish, was it not supposed to be? I loved the restaurants in New England, they always put really strong vinegar on the table when serving fish. Amazing how vinegar improves the stuff.

I'd eat a lot more fish if they tasted like Jersey steer, but if you eat fish that doesn't taste fishy, something is wrong with it.

At a guess a 1 1/2-2 miles of it is bank fishing only, no wading and all of Zone 1 from the hatchery out flow to Dry Hollow is, and you can park within 40-70' of the water. Probably 1/2 of Zone 2 (1/2 mile +?) is bank fishing but a longer walk from the car, perhaps up to a couple hundred yards of pretty flat mowed ground. There is not much easy access in Zone 3. Three ADA accesses, two in Z-1 and one in Z-2. All of the water in the developed part of the park is easy access in my 70+ opinion, even the C&R wading section of Z-2. I don't think there is much comparison with BSSP, the way I recall BSSP from 20-30 years ago. Fly fishing in the park usually means spinning gear and Rooster Tails, so it's all open to him from that aspect.

I missed that. Got a link to the China rod?

Ive never had much luck fly fishing blown out creeks, what do you do and what areas do you target when water is this high?

The casting was the first thing I noted, but then he pulled up that stringer of fish. I don't cast very well or very far, yet I've caught several fish on the fly rod. I may catch one today if I get off my lazy.

I'll just mention that water is still pretty high (flooding and flash flooding) here and we still have rain in the forecast. I have not seen a gravel bar on the local creek for weeks. I'm a bit west and bit north of there, couple hours altogether, but the storms that hit me also hit that drainage as a rule. Three weeks might still be seeing high conditions, just food for thought.

I don't use knots that really need wetting, but I've read that lip balm does a better job than spit. Palomar is a good knot and so is the Pitzen, pita to tie imo, If you like the uni (or Duncan) an extra turn through the eye makes it the Fish N Fool contest winner. The Trilene knot is just another variation on the clinch. Except for the math and physics (all knots must come in at less than 100%) this chart and list is interesting https://www.knotsforfishing.com/knot-strength-chart/

It depends on some things like line size, hook size etc., but there are a few knots I'd learn before I used any form of clinch knot in less than ~20# test. The doubling of the line should make it a better knot though. A couple of "contest winners" that I might use - https://www.netknots.com/fishing_knots/fish-n-fool-knot & https://www.netknots.com/fishing_knots/orvis-knot

5-10% isn't news they have studied it in every way they could think of, I think I read such stuff about 1980, but, there has always been enough whitewash to go around too, C&R is popular with a lot of permit buyers, permits that wouldn't get sold otherwise, and those sales rely on a pretty picture of survival. If length limits mean 5-10 juvenile fish die out of every 100 caught that also mean 90% lived to get bigger and perhaps to spawn. Or to feed the birds. Personally I'm not convinced that either limits or size limits have a great deal of effect long term or on a large scale, but they both make a lot of people feel good, so there's that. Neither are enforced very strictly, and with enforcement the results are not due to the limits.

Wrench, I was told that enough trout die during the C&R at RRSP that it requires stocking several times through the winter to keep the numbers up. I've seen trout mortality studies in other places that fall into the range Al mentioned. I suspect mortality is higher in the real world than it is in any study done by folks used to handling fish. I've watched a trout dropped in the gravel three times, stood on so the fellow could recapture it, then held by the lip, all for a picture, it was released eventually. That's assuming that a lot of giggers want to eat the bass, wanton waste laws and enforcement should curtail any interest in throwing bass (or buffalo) on the bank. But if we don't keep fish we are fine as long as they don't ban fishing. I think you are pretty close on the C&R kill at 10% and yep I reckon that every limit of bass means a couple of juveniles died too. My observation makes me believe that in this drainage less than 1/2 the SMB caught are legal. And I'd bet that close to 1/2 the anglers aren't legal either.

You guys are going to talk me into restoring the '85 F250.

Light trucks are designed to look like and be like luxury cars because the people that buy them never haul anything but kids and toys. When is the last time you saw a pickup with a stock rack? or a one ton with grain sides?

Very important!

To be fair the guy that said bass would be too easy had a point as well. What makes bass "special" to rod and reel anglers is the fact that they are so easy, so of course they'd be easy by any method. My real point is that if we don't believe people would honor limits on bass, how can we think that they will honor limits on "trash fish"? Any day at a trout park will show that many do disregard the limits, even in those tightly controlled areas. My ideal is that there be enforceable limits on every species of fish (including bait fish and others) and hard wanton waste laws and that those laws apply to all fishers regardless of tackle. No one thinks that spin anglers should have separate rules from casting anglers, yet there is the thought that fly fishing and grabbing and gigging all call for special rules. I'm OK with tournaments as long as they only catch the daily limit and no culling allowed, (no other angler is allowed to cull) but, the number of tournaments on any given body of water also needs to have limits. And we need the wildlife agencies to spend as much money on enforcement as they do on public relations and advertising. (and some studies fall into those categories)

Lead fumes are always a danger when melting and pouring, it's why you stand upwind. The lead dust from handling the lead prior to melting and the poured products afterwards are also pretty bad for the health. I really don't think the acid is embedded in the lead, I believe all the reaction/ion exchange takes place at the surface of the plates. The build up on the plates that kills the battery is a salt iirc, or neutralized acid, I think if it was still acid the battery would still work, but the sulfate salt deposits reduce the surface area of the lead that can contact the remaining acid electrolyte causing loss of charge capability. Reconditioning removes the sulfate deposits from the plates and loads the case with new acid, a good battery reconditioned should last about as long as the same battery did new, in theory, because it has the same plate area and electrolyte capacity, however the battery rebuilders I used to know just guaranteed them for a year. I will agree with Dutch that batteries aren't worth the effort for the little bit of lead salvaged. 30-40 years ago they had a lot more lead in them and might have been worth the work, not so with the newer stuff. Take them to the recyclers and buy ingots or lead flashing.

Was it DNR though? They do sewage and mines mostly and run state parks as side line, I didn't think they owned any fish.

But limits, man, no one would ever exceed the limits. It would not be legal to kill more one way than another. The only difference it would make is one guy would limit out in ten minutes and have to go home while the other guy could stay there and beat the water all day. Six dead fish are dead fish any how they get dead.

I'm curious why you think that?