Brian Sloss

The water has actually crested and is currently only about 6-7 inches above normal, though plenty off color. Should clear in a couple days though. Surprising, I've seen less rain do more damage.

Took a couple of St. Louis guys (Roger and Ted) fishing in the drift boat Friday and the fishing was fantastic. Too many fish hooked to keep track of. They caught most of their fish on stoneflies, Don's Crawdads, and eggs most of all. They fished deep all day and the deep water on the backside of all the islands was most productive. I don't know what else to say about the day except the fishing is red hot! Roger and Ted were fun to hang out with and a good time was had by all. The Sat trip was unfortunately rained out and the water is on the rise. The lower river around 142 has flooded, but the upper remains ok, but still coming up and I don't know how high it will crest. The Spring river (just south of here) actually had a drowning they were pulling people off the river last night. The Eleven Point flows into the Spring, so that may back up the Eleven Point and cause high waters tomarrow. We will see.

Did some "scouting" for a couple of guide trips this weekend and the fishing is red hot. Now through the winter is the time to get down here. There are plenty of open dates for guide trips if you want to chase trout. I'll give a more detailed report after the guide trips this weekend.

It was released and was still in great shape, very fiesty still. She caught it within the first 45 minutes below Turner and from the description they gave, I think it was in the shoal below Stinking Pond. Now that you know that, hopefully the next person will return the favor and release it if they get lucky enough to catch it as well.

was not measured, but they guessed 5-7lbs.

Yes, Marvin it was one of yours.

She was fly fishing and I think it was on the Don's crawdad.

Andy and Jenny Meyers of Kansas City decided to float and fish the Eleven Point for the first time on Sat. They floated from Turner Mill to Whitten, fly fishing their way down river. Most of their fish came on Don's Crawdad, with golden stones and hex nymphs doing well too. Anyway not long after getting under way, Jenny hooked and landed her biggest fish ever and I thought you folks would like to see it.

Thanks guys, a report upcoming on Eleven Point page.

Does anyone know how to move a picture that was emailed to me from outlook express to my zoom browser file. Thanks in advance for any help.

My business partner, Ryan Griffin, does our smallmouth trips and should be available just about anytime outside of the first week of Oct., which is our annual trip to Michigan to fish the salmon run. How about 1 day of smallmouth and 1 day of trophy trout? I say this because after mid Sept. the trophy trout area should be on fire. Brian Sloss

have notI been able to get out and do much fishing lately as the last push of the canoe season has kept me busy, but the following is what I've been hearing. The golden stones are out and about, so golden stone nymphs have been catching a few, but none on top though you may may be able to get a stocker or two in the white ribbon area, but it won't be as productive as fishing a nymph. The white ribbon area is fishing better due to the regular stockings. They are putting more fish down there this year than in the recent past. The blue ribbon area has slowed during the hottest time of the year, but experienced Eleven Point anglers are still catching reasonable numbers with the best catch rates being from Little Huricane down and right at the confluence of Greer spring and the river. Good smallmouth reports have been coming in over the past couple of weeks as well. Cane Bluff to Greer fished well for a couple 2 or 3 days ago as has the stretch between Whitten and 142. Tube baits and any crawdad imitation have been getting the best results. I have not heard any Goggle-eye or pickerel reports lately, but I know they are out there. The fall guiding season is coming up and the best fishing will be late Sept. through Dec., but the fishing should remain good through at least June in the Blue ribbon area. I have plenty of open dates if anyone wants to go out in the drift boat for a guide trip

This has been an entertaining thread to say the least.

Nice Report, I look forward to seeing you down this way again next year! Brian

Unless you will be here for an extended stay, it may be more economical to get daily tags at $5.50 per day.

If MDC had their way, brown trout would be in the 11pt right now. The forest service won't allow it to happen. I've even heard from an agent down this way that they even had them on the truck ready to bring them to the 11pt, when the forest service said no at the last minute. Unfortunately, I think the MDC has given up trying. If there were ever a river in MO that could grow big Browns, the 11pt would be it.

We are having our 2nd annual fly flingers weekend down at the Eleven point river if anyone out there is interested. We are going to have a free BBQ and raffle off a Temple Fork Pro series 5wt, 9ft rod, some flies and any other gear we can get together for TU. Also 10% of any canoe rental will go to TU as well. Mostly it will be a chance to exchange info and socialize with other anglers who enjoy the Eleven Point. The fishing is always off the charts that time of year as well. We will be hosting this event Oct. 21-22 and sincerely hope some of you will attend. I will post any info needed regarding lodgings or other particulars if anyone is interested. Thanks, Brian Sloss

You have not offended me at all so no apology needed and I am sorry if I have offended you in the least. It just that even though I think PETA is a misguided organization, I don't believe that putting them on the level or even the same breath as an Osama Bin Laden is fair when discussing the legitimacy of a nonprofit organization. They have thrown fake blood on people with furs and done stupid cartoons about Daddy fishing. Offensive and stupid, yes. Even a misdomeaor in regard to their actions regarding fur. But they don't ram airplanes into the world trade center buildings. My point was to keep the debate in perspective. Idiots: yes they are. World class terrorists: No they are not. I'm sorry if I took what you said out of context, but it seemed to be an extreme statement at the time and it didn't seem to be a fair statement. I am not losing any sleep about this subject and I shouldn't have posted anything, I just saw what I thought to be an unfair characterization and tried to put it back in perspective. When it is implied that PETA is tied to Bin Laden, it makes those comparing the two just as outragous as the PETA causes. It just doesn't help the arguement against PETA. Now I'm going to click on the PETA link and make Phil 50 cents or whatever it is. No offense intended.

You have to know the Bin Laden thing is as crazy an assertion as PETA is in most all their causes, and to put it out on the forum saying I just read it somewhere ...well it doesn't take much of a step to see what you were implying. That being said, PETA is a silly group that I don't support and never will.

Boy has this discussion has degraded, people are implying others are communists. Awful heated debate for a fishing forum. I've seen some below the belt posts on this thread. ...and I mean below the belt on both sides.

PETA is a out there group that I don't agree with, but ties to Bin Laden, you have got to be kidding. I hope so anyway, that is an outragous claim you are making.

Thay have been stocking trout very regular, in fact MDC is putting in about 4000 more trout this year in that section than they did in the previous years. In July they have been stocking weekly and in June I think they hit the White ribbon area 3 times. There is maybe a slow day or 2 here and there, but by and large people have been catching fish on a regular basis in that section all summer.

Got out to fish for about four hours between Turner Mill and Whitten yesterday and the fishing was good. Stoneflies and Don's Crawdad's fished deep were the key. I took one of our employees along to try his hand at fly fishing (he has tried in the past with no success). He caught his first 5 trout on a fly rod which was really cool. I caught plenty as well, but don't remember the exact number. The highlight for me was a 17 inch beauty. we could have caught a lot more, but time constraints forced us to keep moving and really limited our fishing. The entire white ribbon area (Turner to Riverton, 14 miles) has been fishing good all summer.

Although this is posted under Brian's login name, it is being written by his business partner Ryan Griffin. On Monday I guided a Columbia gentleman and a Springfield gentleman (Tom and Byron) on a trip from Whitten down to Riverton. We were targeting smallies but as I will expound on later, we ended up with quite a mixed bag of species. We got the drift boat in the water around 7:30 and despite a recent trout stocking by MDC we had a pretty slow first hour with only one smallmouth landed by Byron. Instead of going into despair we dug deeper into the tackleboxes and mixed up lures and colors. About 9:30 the fishing picked up and stayed very steady the rest of the day. It was a bit of an odd day in that in many areas that looked suited to smallmouth we would pick up a trout, and many 'trouty' runs were producing smallies. I hope this didn't make the boys lose confidence in their guide! The best lures for the day were mid-level and deep diving Rapala shads thrown by Tom and Byron had luck with a 1/4 oz jig with twin tail 4" green pumkin grub. Both men caught fish on Rebel Crawdads with the "Cajun" color being the most effective. Byron also had a good smallie on a top water plug pulled through a small riffle. Though we didn't keep a precise count we tallied around 45 total fish including 2 chain pickerel (the one species that was where it was supposed to be all day: slow water with weeds), 6-9 trout including a 16-17 incher that Tom picked up as I cooked lunch, 10-12 goggle eye with a couple being or close to keeper length of 8", and 22-26 smallies. The smallmouth were almost all in the 12-15" range with a few under and at least two over the 15" minimum length to keep. All the fish were returned safely to the water although a few were immortalized on film next to the smiling faces of Tom and Byron. Byron was busy on Tuesday so Tom and I hit the lower river from Riverton to 142 (The Narrows). Like Monday the day started slow and unfortunately it stayed that way. Tom ended up with 15 or 16 fish but there was no real 'hot streak' other than 3 smallies in a row after lunch that fell to a purple smoke grub yanked along downed trees. The shads picked up a few fish as did the crawdads but nothing was consistently working and we spent quite a bit of time changing lures. Tom again had a three species day (smallie, trout goggle-eye) but the smallmouth were noticably smaller with many in the 8-10" range. Although not usually thought of as trout water, we did pick up two rainbows with one being over 2 miles below the 160 bridge. I would guess that the small flood we had a couple of weeks ago may have pushed them downstream and they have yet to make it back up. All in all, they were two good days of fishing and I enjoyed the company of Tom and Byron. We hope to see them on the river again soon.

Cane Bluff to Greer is great smallmouth water. You can still float there this year for another week or so unless we get another good rain which would extend that time frame. You will drag a couple times and may have to pull through 1 or 2 small shoals, but you can do it. There are smallies evrywhere in the river, even in the Blue Ribbon area from Greer to Turner. The best reports are coming from whitten down to 142 lately for smallies. We will have a detailed smallie report tomarrow as Ryan, my business partner, is doing a 2 day smallmouth guided trip covering Whitten to 142 right now. Look for the report tomarrow.