WestCentralFisher

Spent the weekend down at Montauk. Original intention was to float the trout section of the Current, but for multiple reasons it didn't work out. So a wade fishing trip it was. Friday night, we waded and fished the blue ribbon section, and did reasonably well, catching and releasing some browns on little crankbaits and spinners. I already posted about that in the Current River forum, so on to Saturday. We ended up fishing in the park yesterday, which based on some not entirely positive experiences at Bennett recently, I'll admit wasn't my first choice and I was a little salty, but I got out voted and that's how it goes. And guess what? It was lovely. Yes, there were people, but I forgot just how much more room there was to spread out at Montauk. Limiting out was barely an inconvenience and took almost exactly an hour; the most interesting part was me losing my fillet knife, buying another at just a bit of an upgraded cost at the park store, and then promptly finding my knife right after. I love limiting out early because it allows me to hike around and take in the scenery, which is lovely at Montauk. Pictures to come if the uploader thing likes me today. Largely from hiking around after I got done fishing but managed to get at least one fish picture this time 😆

Did some wade fishing this evening. The Blue Ribbon section was predictably low and slow, but did ok for medium sized brown trout with the rebel craw right around dusk/ a little after. None that would have been legal sized, not that we would have kept them anyway, but good enough to be real fun. Will try again in the AM. Looks too low to float without immense difficulty so its probably gonna be a wading trip. River and scenery sure is pretty, though. More to come after tomorrow, hopefully.

Thanks! This does help. I am really hoping for the summer crowds to be thinned out considerably, but we'll have to see.

Last minute trip coming together for this weekend. Looking to float and fish for trout. Is it completely nuts to try to float Baptist to Cedar Grove in fall low water in minimally loaded down kayaks? I know we'll drag a lot, but trying to figure out where we might end up on the scale from "a little annoying" to "hiking trip with kayak in tow". Also considering Cedar Grove to Akers since at least ~half will for sure have solid flow below Welch Spring.

Probably gonna be too late to ve helpful, but it should be fine. It's a windy Ozark road but better than most. I don't have a boat to haul but I see plenty of boats and rv trailers going down that road faster than I'd be comfortable going in my car, so I assume it's plenty passable.

Was maybe on the water 90 minutes near Jerome and caught 2, one smallmouth and one largemouth, both around 10 inches. That said, I was on the water at the exact wrong time of day, and time-constrained. I have had some good days on that stretch, from a fish catching perspective this just wasn't one of them. That stretch of river is impressive. It reminds me more of the big water smallmouth streams I've fished in West Virginia and New York than anything in Missouri. This was a trip born of being in the area and having some time to kill, so I only had my one little river smallmouth tackle box and the light action rod I always keep stowed away in the car for this exact reason. I was just glad I had left a couple rooster tail spinners in there for the trout stream. They were really too big for a little creek like that, and I had a lot more follows than takes, but there is almost always one little guy with eyes bigger than his stomach.

Spent the day fishing one of the bigger Ozark rivers, and one of its little spring-fed tributaries. Fishing was real slow, but great way to spend a day

I looked at my watch and I had about 20 seconds left until the time I told my fiancee I would start heading home, and for all intents and purposes I was still trying to get the skunk off. Just enough time for one more good cast. I hadn't actually been skunked, but if you're a fisherman, you know what I mean. This stretch of river is about as reliable for catching smallmouth as any near home. But today the water was really slow and a bit too clear. The fish could see you coming from a mile away. It didn't help that the reel on my ultralight had broken right at the start of the day, so I had to use a medium action that is generally reserved for bass fishing on the big lakes. I couldn't cast the little lures I prefer to use anywhere near far enough. But I still caught some fish. A few 4-6 inch smallmouth hit the rebel craw, as well as a 12 inch spotted bass. But I hadn't caught a single smallmouth big enough that if it were legal and not blatantly unethical, you couldn't have theoretically used to catch a much bigger smallmouth bass. This was not a day-ruiner by any means. The river is very pretty and it's a Friday afternoon. But it's not entirely acceptable either, and still essentially amounts to a skunk, even if it doesn't meet the technical definition. Back to the last cast. By now I've switched to and stuck with a ned rig, on account of the fact that it was the only thing that I'd even seen a decent sized bass follow. But we all know lasts casts are a bad business. For one thing, if you ever get to the point where counting down casts feels necessary, things probably haven't gone to plan. And you're probably distracted, halfway on the road mentally, and thinking about whatever is next. But this particular last cast lands next to a log in good current. The wind had kicked up, so I wasn't too visible. And sure enough, I feel the tap, tap, thunk of a smallmouth bass taking a ned-rigged plastic worm. I actually complete the hookset this time, far from a given based on my earlier experience today. It's a good fish, not necesarily big, but enough to put up a real good fight even on my ludicrously too heavy tackle. After a short but sharp fight, I lamd him, and he's a beauty, a 15 inch picture perfect Ozark river smallmouth. I hold him up for a few seconds against the view of the foothills of the Ozarks in the background, then let him go. This exchange will make me 5 minutes late getting home, but I think that's a trade I'll take.

A few years back, I got suckered into floating from Eminence to Two Rivers on Labor Day weekend. It was one of the most insane river environments I've ever experienced and was kind of dreadful from that standpoint. But from a pure fish catching perspective, it was really quite good, though I am legitimately surprised at no point did I unintentionally hook someone. As someone who is always careful to be extra quiet wading, realizing that the fish in these types of rivers simply do not care at all about hundreds of the loudest canoers in America paddling directly above their head is endlessly strange to me. Strange experience, overall. I'm sure it would be a nice stretch to float on a week day.

Yeah, it wasn't bad at all, given it said the temp was 95 or so.

Checked out a new section of stream to see of it was any good for smallmouth. It was not, at least today, in this specific spot. But it was very pretty, and I managed to stumble upon a school of walleye*, which livened things up a bit. Also found some of the most aggressive bluegill potentially in America (you'd think switching to a rattle-trap would keep the bluegill away, and you'd be wrong) and a few little largemouth. *Yes, I should have done better holding the walleye. I'll admit I was not prepared to catch fish with teeth today that I couldn't lip on this little stream, and it threw me. I'll do better next time.

Thinking about doing that float in late September when the crowds start to thin a bit. Looking forward to your report

None of how t Yeah, and I am aware of all that. This was less a result of not knowing the landscape, and more the way plans sometimes go straight to heck on you. Almost none of how this trip played out according to plan. For one, the trip was supposed to be today, a Monday, I was supposed to be floating, and it was supposed to be an overnighter. Then life intervened, Monday became unavailable, it had to be Saturday or no time at all, and without some really unreasonable logistical finagling, or paying a rod fee, the only places I had time to go to that hold trout in August were Bennett Spring and the white ribbon section of the Niangua. Now I could have bailed on trout and just chased smallmouth, and I kind of end up doing that anyway, but I really felt like trout fishing. I simply overestimated my ability to not be annoyed by crowds. At the end of the day, I ended up on a river, I caught (a) trout and some hard fighting smallmouth bass, and yes, got a little annoyed once or twice. In terms of salvaging a trip that almost didn't and arguably shouldn't have happened, it could have ended worse.

One other thing: I don't want to go too far out on a limb, but I think the word has gotten out on that Bennett Spring place. I kid of course, but though I can't be surprised on the last weekend before many schools start in beautiful weather, the place was POPPING. Barely a parking spot to be had. I will admit my original plan was to catch a few fish in the park and then see where the rest of the day took me, but 5 minutes after the buzzer, someone walked directly in front of the spot I'd staked out 30 minutes before the horn, I mean like 2 feet in front of me, and started casting. I can deal with it if it's a kid or someone who is obviously new to fishing, but that didn't seem to be the case. I could feel my blood pressure starting to rise, and decided that getting in the car and fishing the river before the canoe rental crowds was the correct play. I still had no particular shortage of company, but it was much more manageable.

Generally speaking I agree! In this specific situation, my phone was in a dry box inside my day pack, so accessing it for a quick fish photo wasn't very easy. So it would have been something pretty out of the ordinary for me to do it. Of course, scenery pictures are easier to plan for.

Fished the Niangua this morning for a couple hours before the aluminum hatch. Caught one rainbow and a fair number of smallmouth and goggle eye. None of the fish were picture worthy, but the river sure was.

See, though I'm going fishing this weekend on a popular stretch of trout stream, so I was hoping for nasty weather and maybe a nice pop up thunderstorm or six to scare folks off. There are limits to my generosity toward my fellow man.

The first step is seeing others as humans. There are a heck of a lot of people I disagree with, sometimes to an extent where I don't understand how they believe what they do. But there are really few that I wouldn't sit down with around a campfire and talk to and try to understand where they're coming from. I have three really good friends in the world, and two of them are the exact opposite of me politically. Does it occasionally make a fishing trip go sideways with an argument? I'd be lying if I said no. But at the end of the day we'd still do anything for each other. I feel like that is getting more and more rare, and it troubles me.

When I was on the Eleven Point River a couple weeks ago, there was a gentleman we happened to run into both when we put our canoes in, and when we came back to pick our vehicle up after we were done. He'd done a different float and while he wouldn't outright say he'd caught fish hand over fist, the look on his face when he said "Oh, it was OK I guess" told me otherwise. We talked for awhile about fishing and river birds and how to avoid those sweepers on outside bends, and what in the name of everything that was holy made that horrible screeching (hopefully) bird sound you always heard in the night while camping on the Eleven Point. Conversation drifted a bit further afield, until it hit current events. I liked this guy, so I'll admit I tensed up. What if he said something that caused this nice chance meeting to sour? And he did express a political opinion, a pretty strident one. And it's not anyone's business what it was, or if I agreed, it anything else. But as soon as he was done, he paused for a second and said the following to us: "I can't quite tell if y'all agree or not, and that's OK. The fact that you spent the last two days on this river and we can talk this long about fishing means you're alright." Then we talked a bit more about paddling tactics and parted as friends, only because we were all hungry as heck and heading in separate directions. We need way more interactions like this, in my view.

The goofiest I've had was when I was confronted by a fisherman in the Blue Ribbon section of the Current for fishing with a single hook rooster tail spinner. "It's fly fishing only down here, sir" he confidently informed me. It's not, obviously, but ironically my tackle would have been perfectly legal in every public fly-only section of trout stream in the state.

Just a few pictures from places I've been to in the Ozarks the last few weeks. The last two places are Ha Ha Tonka State Park and the Truman Tailwater. The first three were taken at (/sorry my keyboard just stopped working)

My goal this spring and summer has been to get back where I used to be. It's not as if I ever stopped fishing. I doubt there is a year since I was born where the number of times I'd been on the water has been <10. But it had fallen out of being a regular habit, and I'd gotten really lazy about fishing a few spots around home and not really venturing further. I think I've done a pretty good job getting back into the rhythm. Pretty much every weekend I don't have an ironclad obligation, at least for a few hours I find myself on an Ozark creek or river. I've done a few bigger, multi day trips, but a lot of smaller scale ones to a few little Ozark creeks I've found. I'm still not quite as good at reading water as I used to be, and I haven't even really begun getting back into fly fishing yet, but it's a really good start. The more I get back into it, the more I want to even more. I do hope to pick up the fly rod more often, and that's the next venture. We've got a three day trip on the blue and white ribbon section of the Current planned for October; my plan is to practice enough by then to catch a few half decent browns on that trip.

It's a fun walk and wade stream in the fall when the water is low and the canoe rentals aren't running anymore. I don't even like canoeing it without a fishing pole during the summer. Not that it has anything you'd call a rapid, but the riffles are way too narrow for playing dodge-a-tube to be fun.

I agree with your point about it being potentially damaging to talk up little known places (hence the post), but I'd counter that the impulse is perfectly natural and doesn't necessarily come from a cynical place. When I go fishing, I have the impulse to share how it went, to show pictures, etc. That's because for me, I think I value the story and the memory of a trip to a beautiful place about as much as the experience itself anymore. It really is very rarely about bragging or talking myself up. The lord's truth is that I'm a pretty mediocre fisherman with a fairly middling list of local places to fish. Sure, every once in a blue moon I'll catch an 18 inch smallie or big rainbow that I want to brag on a little, but far more often it's a pretty sunset at a gravel bar camp, or a little longear sunfish that looks like something that should have come out of the Amazon (see above) or a little wild rainbow with parr marks on it. It is, in some small way how I share with the world a little of the peace and joy that comes with the exercise of putting a line in the water. That's not a bad thing. I just don't actually have to name the river unless it's the Current, Eleven Point, or another in a long list that have already saturated the public consciousness enough that it isn't going to matter much.

Visited one of my hidden gems this evening. Good way to cap a week.