ozark trout fisher

Goodness gracious, this topic was supposed to be a joke! I shoulda known better than to post it here though. In any case I make an advance apology to the administrators for some potential headaches that this thread may cause. Not my intention...

April Fools!

I am in agreement there. Any damage to fish populations that otters have done is insignificant alongside cattle, gravel mining, dams, channelization, atvs, and all the other fun things we do to ruin our watersheds. And who says that Otters are any less important, than say, smallmouth bass? Just because you can't fish for them doesn't make them any less valuable. They are an important part of Ozark stream ecosystems, and it doesn't matter whether they are convenient for us as fisherman.

Seriously? I am all about catch and release in the Blue Ribbon areas and I wouldn't keep a fish there, but those fish in the park are stocked every day, and if he hadn't kept it someone else would have soon. I don't usually fish the parks anymore, but when I do I keep everything I catch within the law, and I'll make no apologies for it. When you start chewing people for keeping trout park fish, it begins to come off a little wrong. Great fish by the way.

Awesome report and pictures.Anybody that uses a #30 fly is crazy! But I mean that in a good kind of way.I am not even capable of tying on a fly smaller than about #24...and I'm not capable of catching a fish on one smaller than a #22. 8x tippet I guess?

I think gravel dredging/mining is far and away the worst problem on most of the smaller Ozark streams that I fish. Many streams that I have spent time on, including Little Piney below Vida Slab, Brazil (as Smalliebigs already mentioned) and many other streams that could offer excellent fishing are completely ravaged. On the Little Piney for example, you can find long stretches in the areas where gravel dredging has been particularly heavy where there are virtually no fish at all, save the occasional chub or sucker. The stream is just one wide, shallow run in these areas with just about no cover. In the areas that haven't been hit so hard, it's one of the nicest creeks in the state for trout and smallies with some really beautiful deep pools-it is just amazing the difference gravel mining makes on streams like that. Livestock also are a real difficulty for streams like Little Piney. Of course the other threat that I don't think has been mentioned are dams. As hydro-power starts looking more and more attractive as an alternative to coal and nuclear power, we are probably going to have some fights to keep some of the larger Ozark streams free-flowing at all. And the smaller streams aren't safe either, because they can be wanted for drinking water. That almost was the end of Crane Creek and a couple other southwestern streams a few years back, if my memory serves me.

Very nice. Thanks for the report. I am heading down to Baptist not this coming weekend but the next. If I can pick up some fish like that it will be a very good trip indeed.

Between the park and the mouth of Dry Fork I will pretty readily fish it up to 650 CFS, and I have had good success at times at up to 800 although that is getting a little sketchy both for fishing and safety in a few areas. Below Dry Fork, 500 is a pretty good number to go by.

With luck I may be...I worry that by the time I'm done puttering around on Ozark streams there may not be much left to fish for, and that may be the least of our problems too. But I guess it's no good being so negative. I do what I can environmentally to help in whatever small way I can, but I know deep down it's not enough. Past that I can only keep fishing our Ozark streams that remain stunningly beautiful and enjoy what I have while it's still there. There is nothing else to do, and there is no guarantees any of the places I love in the Ozarks or anywhere else will still be in anywhere near the same condition in a few decades.

That's about the size of it. And the truly amazing thing about it is we have achieved most of that in the last 150-200 years. What is really scary is to think about where we will be in another 150-200 years, or even another 50 for that matter. It's not a thought I like to dwell on.

The interstates.

I'm glad you had a good time. I was expecting a considerably more gloomy report based on the title.

I personally would love to see wolves back in Missouri. But I don't think it can ever happen in any kind of significant numbers. Aside from all the public opinion concerns, I don't think we have the habitat in Missouri anymore, probably not even in the wildest parts of the Ozarks. Wolves need plenty of room to roam, and I'm afraid that there just isn't enough of that in Missouri. Our state is just too densely populated for a species like that. In other words I really don't think we have anything to worry about. The ecosystem of our state is almost certainly far too messed up for such a truly wild, beautiful and native species to have a chance at survival.

I have done well with conehead muddlers for browns on the Current-most of the browns that I have caught there of considerably above average size(18+") have come on that. That's a fair imitation of a sculpin and I guess that is what they take it for. That said, I am not really the guy to ask about big streamers and big browns. When I talk about 18"+ fish I've caught on the Current, that number is well in the single digits and I fish there rather often. I am 95% a small nymph and dry fly guy. I need to buy a sink-tip line and then maybe I can get in the streamer game for real. Then again maybe not- I love fishing the caddis hatches on that river.

Thanks for the report. I enjoyed the pics. The picture of the minnow reminded me of a funny story.I was nymphing in a run a little ways below Baptist Camp, and I saw my indicator pause in the current a little. I set the hook, and there was just a slight resistance, and I knew I was just into a chub or a shiner of something like that. I was just stripping him in to slip him off the hook when the resistance got a lot heavier. A 15" brown had taken the minnow while I was bringing it in! Does that count as live bait fishing??? I don't know-it was certainly not intentional. I was kind of relieved when the brown got off before I brought him to net.

I read in some book about fishing Missouri several years ago that there was a small breeding population of Northerns in the Mississippi right around the Northern border of Missouri. I have no idea if there is any truth to that, but I thought it was kind of an interesting note. Here at Lake Sherwood there was a stocking of Northerns a long time ago in a fairly deep 100 acre lake, and rumor has it that they were caught for about 5-10 years after the stocking. I have it on pretty good authority that the stocking occurred, but the stories of them being caught years after are just stories-they may or may not actually be true. It seems extremely unlikely to me that Northerns are native to a stream like the Meramec, or anywhere else in Missouri far south of the Iowa line. I think you may be getting them confused with pickeral, which are basically a smaller version of Northern Pike that can handle warmer water temperatures. It's a common mistake, and before I knew any better, I once saw a pickeral swimming around in the upper Current while I was trout fishing and thought it was a small Northern. I said so to another fisherman later on in the day and learned my mistake.

I wish I could come to the meeting but it just isn't possible. I live on the exact opposite end of the state as Shepard of the Hills and the gas money isn't there-heck I haven't even been able to make it down to an Ozark trout stream for weeks for the same reason, although I fully intend that change that next weekend. I am still split on the felt soles thing. I have them and use them, but I never take the pair I use here in Missouri out of state, so I feel like it's extremely unlikely that I am doing any harm. But if a ban on felt soles is necessary to keep Didymo out of Missouri streams, I guess it's a sacrifice that I am willing to make. But it would be a major bummer in a lot of ways. Felt soles are a real life-line in hard to wade places.

Keep on bragging. I enjoyed your report.

I really don't understand all the complaining about the crowds on the Current and the reports/pictures on here that may be playing some tiny part in them. The Current has all the blessings and the curses that go with a truly great trout water. It has great numbers of fish, very large fish for the size of the stream, the best hatches in the state,and some of the most heart-breakingly beautiful pools and runs that you will find on any trout stream anywhere in the world. Not to mention excellent access. I honestly believe that as a trout stream it is not very much inferior to rivers like the South Platte in Colorado or the Henry's Fork in Idaho, with the exception of the fact that most of the trout are stocked. This means it will be a famous fishery. It's just inescapable with a river like the Current and there's no use getting frustrated about it. If you want solitude then there is plenty of good trout water in Missouri where you can find that.

I'll make the suggestion once more... If the crowds are too much at Tan Vat or right below the cable, maybe you need to try somewhere else. There are at least five accesses on the Current's trout water below the park, and about 80% of the fishing reports on here are from Tan Vat. I know that water is good up there, but if you're going to fish in the "miracle mile", you're gonna have company. Remember-17 miles. Plenty of room to spread out.

I've heard that too. But I've also heard about a million other ways to define a navigable stream.And the people who seem to know the most about the issue tend to agree that there is plenty of gray area and that the laws are very complicated. I'm also pretty sure whether you can get charged with trespassing may depend more on the beliefs of the county prosecutor more than it does on the legality of the situation. So who knows... I'm not a lawyer and don't want to be. In the end for me it just comes down to common sense and a personal judgment call as to whether a stream is navigable, until I understand what the law is hard and fast. And I really don't think that will ever happen.

That is my understanding too, if the creek is navigable. The question is what does navigable mean. My opinion is that a creek like Crane would be considered navigable, but I don't think anyone, not even a lawyer, could know the answer to that for sure sure. Stream access laws are extremely complicated and leave a lot of gray area. Which is why I would personally favor a "Montana Style" state stream access law for Missouri which would open up all permanent flowing water to fisherman-so long as the entered the stream at a public access and stayed below the high water mark. But I am not looking to derail this topic so maybe I should stop there.

If I went a little overboard myself I apologize. This issue tends to rile me up but no harm was intended.

Who needs a fishing license?

As far as the crowds go, I think that is really dependant on where you are fishing-both at what access and how far from the access you are willing to go. Everybody seems to fish just below the Park, at Tan Vat, or at Baptist. But there are other accesses on the Current's trout water that see a lot less pressure-and the fishing is really good around some of them too. Also if you are willing to stretch your legs and walk a half-mile or so from whatever access you're starting at, you'll find plenty of good water much of which won't have fisherman on it. The really great thing about the Current below the park is that it has 17 miles of trout water. But for some reason most people only use the top 2 or 3 miles even though its all public. Explore further downstream and you'll find a few less fish and a lot less people. Not a bad trade-off all said.