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Wanting To Fish The Meramec For The 1st Time


abkeenan

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Hello to anyone willing to give me some advice or help. I live in Valley Park and was wanting to fish the Meramec River from a canoe that i own and i was wanting to be dropped off and put in up steam in the Pacific Area and float back to my car at the 141 bridge or 44 bridge that cross over the river. I have never floated a river in a canoe and was wondering if some of you more experienced people here might be able to help. I am an experienced angler but always fish from a bass boat at Table Rock so this is new to me. I would like to fish for about 5 hours or so but dont know the time it takes from Pacific??? So some of my questions are....Places to put in? How long would you expect it would take to float it? What lures would you suggest throwing at this time of year? Are there other stetches of the river that are considerably better? Those are some of the questions i have and any thing else i should know would be much appreciated. Thanks in advance.

-Brett

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Bret,

Take a look at the previous post to yours. Al Agnew had some great comments. Also search some of Al's posts. You will find a wealth of information on your questions.

I would suggest putting in at Pacific Palisades, and a take out at Allenton Access. There is a floating service available for this area now, Forest 44 canoe rental. On their website they have approximate float times and mileage.

http://www.forest44canoerental.com/

Regards, Bman

The only good line is a tight line

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Thanks Bman. I already have a canoe so i dont need a rental or any type of service. But looking at the time it takes to navigate the river i guess in order to make it back to my car in Valley Park i would have to put in around the Castlewood Park area i guess. That should put me on the river for around 3 hours or so plus or minus a few hours which is fine. What sort of lures should i be throwing? I was thinking about throwing small crankbaits and inline spinners? Maybe some smaller soft plastics. Anyone been out lately and could steer me in the right direction?

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Thanks Bman. I already have a canoe so i dont need a rental or any type of service. But looking at the time it takes to navigate the river i guess in order to make it back to my car in Valley Park i would have to put in around the Castlewood Park area i guess. That should put me on the river for around 3 hours or so plus or minus a few hours which is fine. What sort of lures should i be throwing? I was thinking about throwing small crankbaits and inline spinners? Maybe some smaller soft plastics. Anyone been out lately and could steer me in the right direction?

abkeenan, The stretch fro Castlwood to Valley Park has some good Kentucky's. I haven't had a lot of luck with smallies. I throw white and chartruese spinners and stickbaits. The water is always murky. You will end up paddling alot as the river is wide and you need to focus on structure that is scattered on either side if the river. Enjoy as there are fish to be caught and few folks trying.

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Mileages to Valley Park...

Times Beach Access at I-44--11.5

Castlewood State Park--3.5

As a general rule, figure on floating one mile per hour if you're mainly fishing with faster moving lures like crankbaits, spinnerbaits, etc. Cut that down to about a half mile an hour if you really like to fish with slower stuff like jigs and soft plastics. Like Goggleye said, most of the structure you'll be fishing will be scattered along the banks on both sides of the river, so you'll need to switch often from bank to bank. And forget about using the small stuff on the lower Meramec. It's always murky and you often need to use decent size lures to get the attention of the better fish. Basically, you could use about anything you use on Table Rock and have a good chance of catching fish.

As I said in the other thread, once you get below Times Beach Access, you're getting into the part of the river that gets backup from the Mississippi in high water, and the smallmouths get pretty scarce and spotted bass take over, with the occasional big largemouth. The spotted bass act pretty much like smallies, however. Concentrate your efforts where the water is moving well, don't spend a lot of time in dead slack water.

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Thanks a bunch goggleye and Al. Like i said i always have fished table rock out of a boat so i dont know much about stream/river fishing. I have only been in this canoe once on Simpson Lake and there is NOTHING going on there i can tell u that so i figured id fish a river nearby with real fish in it. I am going tomorrow morning with a friend and he has decided that he thinks that the stretch of the Meramec from the Pacific Palisades to Allenton would be better to fish so that is going to be where we are going to hit. Thank you for the info about the stretch from Castlewood to Valley Park as im sure i will fish that next time as that was my original plan because its convenient for me. Should i fish this section of the meramec from Pacific to Allenton differently than you guys have described for the Castlewood/Valley Park section? I will report back after tomorrows trip and let you guys know how i did.

Thanks-

Brett

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Brett,

Good luck! We will look forward to your report.

The only good line is a tight line

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I just got back from Route 66 State Park. I was only there for about an hour and a half to play around with my new kayak. The water was pretty murky (very Lake of the Ozarks like), and I didn't catch a thing. That said I wasn't really trying that hard fishing. I was just getting used to the kayak.

"Of all the liars among mankind, the fisherman is the most trustworthy."

"There's a fine line between fishing and standing on the shore like an idiot."

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Thanks a bunch goggleye and Al. Like i said i always have fished table rock out of a boat so i dont know much about stream/river fishing. I have only been in this canoe once on Simpson Lake and there is NOTHING going on there i can tell u that so i figured id fish a river nearby with real fish in it. I am going tomorrow morning with a friend and he has decided that he thinks that the stretch of the Meramec from the Pacific Palisades to Allenton would be better to fish so that is going to be where we are going to hit. Thank you for the info about the stretch from Castlewood to Valley Park as im sure i will fish that next time as that was my original plan because its convenient for me. Should i fish this section of the meramec from Pacific to Allenton differently than you guys have described for the Castlewood/Valley Park section? I will report back after tomorrows trip and let you guys know how i did.

Thanks-

Brett

Brett, Where is that report?

The only good line is a tight line

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