eric1978

There are no fish at Busch! And that's why... A couple of those poll questions are a little tricky or poorly worded. The limit for bluegill as far as I know is 50 per day per person, so that would be one hell of a stringer to even be illegal. And I'd be more concerned to see that happen on a small stream than a farm pond or impoundment, so there are some considerations. Why do two of the questions have to do with old people? Are you exempt from the laws when you reach a certain age or something? I don't care if you're 15 or 115, illegal is illegal. I'd turn in Grandpa in a second if he was poaching in a significant way. And the last question...I'd have to be pretty positive someone is keeping shorts to make a call. If the guy's 50 feet away and he tosses a "questionable" looking fish into the livewell, I'm not gonna jump the gun and start dialing (unless it's a smallmouth ). Save the dime and the CA's time for an important call.

America is in cultural decline and has been for several decades. I find Branson to be pretty lame to begin with, so adding Nelly to the lineup doesn't change much for me, but it does seem totally incongruent.

It's tough to find good deals on new Royalex canoes. Let me know if you locate them. I'd go to craigslist first to look for a used one...a little G-Flex and skid plates and a few mods can make a beater good as new. And I'd consider other models made of other materials. Solos aren't all that heavy even if they're not Royalex. If money isn't a concern, just get a Vagabond. If it is, the OT Guide 119 is a very serviceable canoe, and Dicks usually has them around $400. Also check out Two Brothers Canoes if you want to support a local small business.

I'd like to know what you think was causing their tap water to be flammable then. It's obvious it was natural gas that seeped into their groundwater. I can't get a flame out of my faucet, can you? Irrefutable is a pretty strong word when you don't offer any evidence to back up your claim in the first place. I've yet to hear any alternative argument from you, let alone an "irrefutable" one, and until I hear another reasonable explanation for why people who live near the wells can turn their shower heads into blow torches, I'm going with the fracking. You're welcome to try to convince me otherwise, but I don't think you have any credible or logical hypotheses to do that. I can't wait to hear it, though...I could use a good laugh. JDC, I don't want to start a whole new thing with you here. But just out of curiosity, what do you have to gain by denying that hydraulic fracturing is potentially dangerous to the environment? You're on this forum...I assume protecting our rivers and lakes is important to you. Do you or your family work for an energy company or something? If not, I just don't get it. I used the word "potentially" just for you.

You're right to point out that the government screwed up an agency in charge of oversight, and that contributed to the problems we have in the Gulf. But you have the wrong administration in mind, and it was corruption and cronyism, not negligence.

That's a bad example. That agency was corrupted by you-know-who.

I'm not sure what their salaries have to do with the content, but by that rationale, I'd say energy companies' CEOs and other higher-ups make way too much for the relatively terrible prices we pay for their products considering their windfall profits and the short and long term damage they do to the environment. As far as I can tell, Roundup is doing just fine. It's still on the shelves at Home Depot and Lowes. The proprietary secretiveness is total BS, and it's simply a way for them to keep us from knowing what they're putting in the ground. What differentiates a successful energy company and an unsuccessful energy company is access to the resource (well sites) and their ability to extract them (money, which means equipment, manpower and lobbyists). There are plenty of engineers and scientists to hire that can tell them which lubricants and other chemicals are needed to get the job done...they just don't want us to know what they are because they're obviously harmful. Apparently they were exempted from the Clean Water Act and the Clean Drinking Water Act at least. I'll believe that part of the documentary until proven otherwise. A truck carrying harmful chemicals that flips over on the highway is bad news, too. But it's a localized contamination, and in most cases the majority of the mess can be cleaned up. Fracking causes contamination of groundwater which travels great distances and is impossible to contain or clean. Look at the trouble we're having controlling the oil spill mess, and that's right at the surface. If that problem was a mile below there would be absolutely nothing we could do. I agree with you to an extent, but they were lighting people's tap water on fire. That's a fact. And it takes only common sense to say that's a direct cause of the fracking that is being done near their homes. The other ailments the people in the documentary were having, like the headaches and neuropathy, are harder to prove are being caused by the fracking, but I for one see no reason to deny it. The film was made by an environmentalist, so you can bet it was biased, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's not true. We have a water cooler and drink mostly bottled water (on a side note, the water we drink is Mountain Valley Spring Water from Arkansas...guess I should prepare to switch companies since their source will likely be contaminated if AR continues to allow the expansion of their fracking). We cook and shower with tap water, but I prefer to ingest as little of it as possible...and our water isn't even flammable yet. Our world is filled with contaminants, so much so that it's probably not even worth trying to avoid them anymore, especially when given the fact that I occasionally eat poisonous fast food and still smoke cigarettes...but at least that's a choice I make and can stop that behavior if I tried hard enough. And that's still not a reason to say, "Ah what the hell, we're already living at toxic levels, so go ahead and make it worse." If it meant clean, renewable energy, then yes, I would be okay with that. The energy industry could use some competition anyway...as of right now they have a stranglehold on us with their oligopolies. The film provided empirical evidence that fracking contaminates groundwater...people's faucets are flammable. If natural gas is making its way into the drinking water, then so are the chemicals used for the drilling. Pretty tough to deny that, and even the companies doing the work don't. In fact they are paying for fresh water to be trucked in to some people's homes. If they aren't responsible, why would they do that?

And we're supposed to take their word for it? Ha! I'm sorry, but my trust in energy companies ran out long ago. Screw their proprietary confidentiality. If the crap they pump into the earth can eventually come through the tap in my sink and into my family's mouths, I darn well have the right to know what's in it. It's not Heinz 57, I'm sure of that.

Very nice fish! That cold bottle of water looks pretty good, too.

But c'mon man. You gotta admit that catfish are generally looked at by most anglers more as tasty table fare than sportfish. I throw the big ones back because I don't like how they taste. But you gotta admit, while catfishing can be a hell of a lot of fun, it's not exactly heart-stopping excitement...sitting there pounding beers and watching a tight line.

Couple questions then, Bob: Do you believe stream smallmouth fishing could be improved with a different set of regulations? What regulations would those be in a real world application? We all pretty much agree that different streams have different needs, but realistically we know assigning vastly varying regs to various waters will be not only unacceptable to MDC, but most casual anglers would never figure them out anyway, so they wouldn't work. What would you suggest? In all honesty, I haven't heard much in the way of solutions from you...it seems you're happy with the way things are - mediocre. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

Help me out, Brother. Where do you fish?

Good man.

Nice brown and cool boat! Building one of those is quite an accomplishment. Well done.

Also the same as blue eyes in humans. I was looking into how genes work after we had our baby last week. Pretty interesting stuff.

Ditto, exactly. I couldn't vote either. (Also because I don't get down there every year.) I will never come to Branson for that stuff. We have Six Flags 20 minutes from here (and I avoid that place like the plague, too). If I want crowds I'll go to a Cardinals game, if I want music I'll go to Nashville, if I want a show I'll see something better in the city, and if I want to golf I'll go fishing instead. But I do think the attractions down there are an easy way to distract the family while Dad fishes, so that's a good thing.

All true. It was a good amount of work. And you're also right that the liveries were not servicing that part of the river at those levels. Should have mentioned that.

Scary stuff indeed. Sure hope they don't keep creeping up. Maybe it isn't a terrible thing to see the "Bowhunting Adventures" boat out there. As of right now, I don't know of any other way to control these things. Not that a few bowhunters can put a huge dent in them, but I'd say it's better than nothing. I'd like to see a boat with "Shotgun Adventures" on the side of it, and a guy taking people out with 12 gauges and steel buckshot to blast these critters up and leave 'em for dead. Plenty of people like to kill stuff for the sake of killing...sounds like a match made in heaven. Maybe we should all take our fly rods and billy clubs out to the confluence. Sounds like fun to me.

I think you just answered your own question. Check out the growth rates for smallmouth bass. And by the way, they've never been stocked in the rivers...not successfully anyway. I have no problem with people keeping some trout in a put and take section of river...that's what it's there for. But it's nice to have some Blue Ribbon sections available for people who are more interested in angling than eating. I think the 1 fish > 18" reg is geared more toward keeping a trophy than keeping dinner. I think some harvest of LM and K bass from reservoirs is okay, but I'm of the opinion that the creel limits are somewhat liberal, given the amount of anglers who fish the impoundments. Luckily, many anglers C&R, otherwise fishing would be much tougher if everyone was keeping a limit every time they went out, even though that would be perfectly "legal." I don't see anything wrong with advocating C&R of the sportiest species. Some fish are better to eat, some are better to catch. Discrimination isn't always a bad thing. Eat all the crappie and gills and whites you want...they breed like rabbits and there are tons of them, plus they taste better. But how about leaving the hardest fighting fish that are the most fun to catch for the folks who are really only interested in fishing and prefer to eat cows, chickens and pigs most days. I love a fish fry, too, but there ain't no way I'm gonna toss an 18" smallmouth in the fryer just because it's "legal." I'd much rather catch her again when she's bigger, and in the meantime let her make lots of babies with her good genes. Like some card sharp said, you can shear a sheep many times, but skin it only once.

I didn't see ski ball as an option. You give me a pocket full of dimes and some ski ball and I'm a happy man. I just kinda like the whole feel of the strip, but don't care for any of the attractions in particular. I'd get a giant aquarium for the Landing like BPS has.

I'm not twisting your arm or anything, but seriously, forget about floating near Eminence and go up higher. The river is much prettier above Bay Creek and the shuttle is plenty fast...you won't be sorry, I promise.

I've done it at 30 with a fair amount of dragging. We were heavily loaded, though. I love how the river looks at that level, but it does take some work. The trick is to inconspicuously wade down the riffle and work the head of the next pool while your buddy drags the canoe.

Most of the liveries in Eminence offer floats anywhere on JF (except for the Prongs in summer). The nicest scenery is from Buck Hollow down to Bay Creek, which is a good distance for an overnight, and I would recommend a float from Buck Hollow to Rymers or Blue Spring to Rymers if you just have one day. Prettier, good fishing, no horse poop. You'll have plenty of company if you're there on a weekend though...that goes for any stretch you pick. If you've floated the Huzzah you know what I'm talking about. http://www.harveysalleyspring.com/mapbig.html

Another great video from you, Brian. Awesome work.