Randall

So they can't sell to a private buyer?

I'd be a little careful with that... even if a person is intentionally running dogs on your property, you don't have the right to kill them. If a person parked their car in your driveway you can't dismantle it with a sledgehammer. Protecting your livestock, however, may be a different story, I don't know but it strikes me as being comparable to self-defense. Trespass and nuisance laws provide a legal remedy, not the right to destroy another's property.

I don't know the law on shooting dogs, but it seems like you would have the same right to shoot a dog with no collar molesting your livestock as say a coyote. I would also imagine that the judgment would be appealed by MDC. Just becuase that one judge ruled that the statute is vague doesn't make it so.

I don't know, I'd like to see it become more like an actual stream and less like a pond. Then Gavin's point about how well it measures up to NFOW, 11 Point, and Current rivers is pretty good. It might be better to keep the park the way it is to act as a trap for the bait guys. One thing I don't understand is the way the river stays blown out where the Current drops right out.

Just keep in mind that if the landowner doesn't know you there is no way to know that you are respectful. As a rule, most landowners will kick a trespasser out, no matter how benign, for the reason that they didn't ask permission.

You are right that it is currently owned by the James Foundation. It is operated pursuant to an agreement with MDC and open to the public. If it was bought by a private individual that could potentially all end. I'd be interested to know what the agreement between MDC and the James Foundation looks like though. It could be that MDC has some contractual right to keep the park open.

On a truly navigable stream, I think you are right. On a river like the Current, I think it's public water regardless of who owns the land around it. Blue Springs Creek on the other hand, is not navigable even though water flows through it year round. My point is that we landowners are not just mean people that are out to ruin a fisherman's day. We are people that will almost always allow a person to access our land if they ask. We will also defend our property from those disrespectful trespassers and if we don't know you, we can't differentiate. There's also a reason we come armed. I read a lot of posts condemning the landowners and I don't think they were fair. Again, I don't know that we've ever told a person they couldn't play in the creek, but we've kicked a lot more out for not asking. The bottom line is courtesy and respect. If you don't respect me enough to ask my permission, how do I know you'll respect my property?

It'd make me sick to see it go private. Seems like it should, or could be a money maker if it was properly managed.

There are a lot of landowners that are intolerant of people accessing streams on their property; I'm one of them. My family has land on Lost Creek in Warren County, my folks still live there but I grew up and left. I have confronted a handful of trespassers alone, making every one of them leave, only ever bringing a firearm into the equation once when the guy came at me with a chain, (I never had to point it at him, seeing it was deterrent enough). Dealing with the kind of people we have down there, I've carried every time. You'd really be surprised how often trespassers get aggressive, especially when they have you outnumbered or their girlfriend is there. When you live in an area like we do where people come in and tear up your fields, cook meth in the hollers in the more difficult areas to access, continuously get stuck in the creek, litter, break into your buildings, set broke down cars on fire, and poach, then the law tells you that they won't respond becuase of how far out you live, your bottle will fill up pretty quick. Our creek is in no way navigable by the way, it is intermittent throughtout my entire piece of land and we've had people tell us that they had a right to be there. From our point of view, a trespasser is a trespasser is a trespasser. On a brighter note, Chuck Tryon came out when he was writing his smallmouth book, talked to my dad and got a tour of our ground and a lot of our neighbors' who let us go play in the creek on their property. We've also let strangers have weddings in the waterfall when the water is down and others have played in the "swimming hole". The difference is that they came up and asked. I can't stress how much we appreciate the courtesy. As a landowner with plenty of experience dealing with disrespectful trespassers I will say that if you don't have permission, go somewhere else. If you really want to fish there, find out who owns it and ask first.

Kyle and I went down a month ago and cleaned up. We saw a handful of pig browns and Kyle lost one in the 20-22 inch range plus another just a little smaller. We saw the bigger fish in the deep areas and in places with a lot of cover.

Sounds like they're letting it go... the park is a neat place when you get past the mediocre fishing. I hate to hear its being run into the ground. Maybe they'll just sell it to MDC and they'll turn it into another Bennett or Montauk.

I've seen an article about that pattern but I lost it, thanks for the post. How necessary is the herl over say marabou? I'm sure there's a reason he uses herl, just curious if anybody knows.

It looks good. I do have a few suggestions though. Foam floats, I'm curious how this fly will fish, especially with the big foam mandibles. I would use maybe swiss straw or some other non-floating back and maybe rubber legs for the mandibles. Other than that, the shape, legs, and tails look great. Here is a picture of an actual hellagramite: http://www.troutnut.com/im_regspec/picture_1255_small.jpg

I have some real fond memories from when I was a kid down there. I grew up in Cuba and bait fished the park about once a week until 2000. Now I'll only ever hit certain parts of the river during the Thanksgiving week when I'm in town. The rest of the year I go to the Current or Blue Springs. If you're not fishing, the park is pretty neat though.

I stuck with 4 and 5X tippet on my nymph set-ups both times I've fished there and was fine. I've done well running a prince dropper below the stonefly. Have plenty of shot too; some of the riffles are pretty deep and fast. If you like to streamer fish, there are lots of good places to pound the banks.

We didn't fish the flatter stuff real hard, just kinda drifted through it with the current like you said. That might have picked us up 2 or 3 over the day-and-a-half. We definitely saw one brown that would have gone over 8 pounds and one or two more in the 5-7 pound range all in the really deep spots. I would have loved to pound the banks in a bunch of places but a canoe is not the best platform for that kind of fishing unless you've got a golden shoulder. I know we'll float this river again, for sure in the fall, possibly again this summer. We certainly appreciated the input from everybody too.

Does anybody have the recipe for this pattern? I know I've seen it somewhere before but I can't remember to save my life what it looks like.

You remember freshman year in the fayettenam... what isn't an adventure for us? I guess I actually was at Kelly the last time I was down there... I was under the impression it was public but when I saw it I wasn't quite as sure. What are smallmouth like above Rainbow Spring? On Friday it'll just be me and Kyle I think so we'll do a little playing before the trout water kicks up.

Uhhhh... ... yeah... no. I'd go with the second suggestion.

The sad thing is that scenario is pretty common. We'll see trailers blow up around the county with toys all over the place. Poor kids never have a chance.

I'll be down on the Huzzah this weekend for a bachelor party and don't have to work till Tuesday so I want to hit the NFOW and Bryant Monday if the whites and hybrids are still up. Does anybody konw if they're still around?

I feel your pain. We have some guys coming onto our ground and cooking in a holler behind our barn every once in a while. The law knows who it is, won't tell us, and has yet to make an arrest because they lack sufficient evidence for probable cause. Worse yet they told us that only one deputy has a vehicle that can make it to that part of our property, even though it is a manicured field with prime access to the county road which is in a consistent state of disrepair due to frequent flooding of the adjacent creek. So if we catch them cooking, we were informed that the law will offer us no protection other than during the 40 business hours per week that deputy works. In the same thread, we can't take the law into our own hands because the chances of a confrontation turning violent are extremely high and one or more of them is likely to die in the process and it is unlawful to use deadly force unless used against you first or you are in your home. So we have a wonderful example of how the law in limited circumstances serves the interests of dangerous criminals and interferes with the rights of law abiding citizens.

Wish I could find steady hybrid fishing like that... nice.

It was the Taneycomo rules I was thinking of. I agree mostly with that. I can't knock an angler who keeps the odd legal brown though.

I grew up in Cuba and my mom still lives there and I don't even go the Meramec any more. I've had good days there but a lot more crappy ones. Unless the Current is way low, I prefer it hands down over the Meramec. When the water's all real low, I just go to a tailwater.