Smallmouth Regs

[Chief Grey Bear]

The small creeks are too numerous to consider, the smaller floatable streams have high enough numbers of fish. But increasing length limits and decreasing creel limits overall would be a good blanket regulation that would address the potential problems in these streams. Decrease creel limits to three or four, increase size limits to 14 or 15 inches, and you allow close to the same poundage of fish for a meal while allowing more fish to grow to larger adult sizes. While I think that a slot limit strategy might be the best even for overall regulations, it makes little sense to have the same slot limits on small creeks that you have on the bigger, more fertile rivers, and tailoring slot limits to the size and characteristics of the stream would quickly get very complicated.

I would be much more in favor of a slot limit than anything else I have seen proposed. It is in my mind the most effective managment tool. But that is only if WE comply with it. Not so much on the top end but more importantly on on the bottom end.

The theory behind the slot is that if you remove some of the smaller, more ferious eaters, it will open up more forage for the other fish to grow larger, quicker. And it will work. But it will take all of us working together. But that also doesn't mean you have to keep a limit every time you go either. And you certainly don't have to keep one from the top end of the slot.

I would be most in favor of a 10-13 inch keep 4 on the bottom and only 1 over 16 on the top. That would protect the 13-16 inch fish. Now I could also give a little leeway on that. I also think I could be in favor of that being a blanke reg state wide.

So in a very short, to the point post, that is what I am thinking in a nutshell.

Al, I asked the other day how many were on the BRP. I think you stated about 20 with only around a dozen active. Of those that actively worked on the reccomendation to the MDC, other than you and Bob, were there any others didn't really agree with the new regs but went along with it anyway? I know that looks like a badly worded question but, I don't know how else to ask it. I finally read Bob's article and he didn't seem to agree with the proposal and you stated here that there you didn't seem to agree with all of it. I just wonder if it was kind of hurried and not thoroughly discussed.

[gotmuddy]

the redfish slot limit in Texas coastal waters has been a fabulous success. The slot is 20-28" and one over 28" per year. I would love to see a slot limit on brownies on the buffalo. Maybe 12-14"

[eric1978]

I would be fine with a slot limit, but I would want it much more restrictive than your version, CGB. 14-20, 2 or 3 under, 1 over (smallmouth), and a total of 6 black bass per day (except no limit on spots on Meramec watershed). That's plenty of meat for the eaters, and would leave more of the big boys for the anglers. I'll support any increase in regulations. Any.

[Outside Bend]

Statewide, I like Chief's proposal, somewhere around a 12-16" slot.

I like Eric's more restrictive slot for some of the larger, more productive streams, but to me, on many smaller Ozark streams, it'd be de-facto C&R, or at least setting a maximum length limit of 14 inches. Maybe play with those regs on a few small streams first, see what effect they have on the SMB populations there. If it's positive, and accepted by anglers, I could see it being pushed to other streams, or statewide.

[Guest]

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[gotmuddy]

Statewide, I like Chief's proposal, somewhere around a 12-16" slot.

I like Eric's more restrictive slot for some of the larger, more productive streams, but to me, on many smaller Ozark streams, it'd be de-facto C&R, or at least setting a maximum length limit of 14 inches. Maybe play with those regs on a few small streams first, see what effect they have on the SMB populations there. If it's positive, and accepted by anglers, I could see it being pushed to other streams, or statewide.

If you release every fish caught no fish will get big.

[eric1978]

If you release every fish caught no fish will get big.

That's true in farm ponds, but not necessarily in streams. A healthy riparian system offers high forage production, far more than a muddy hole in the ground. By your rationale, there would have been no big fish in our streams 500 years ago, and I'm pretty sure that's not right.

[Guest]

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[gotmuddy]

That's true in farm ponds, but not necessarily in streams. A healthy riparian system offers high forage production, far more than a muddy hole in the ground. By your rationale, there would have been no big fish in our streams 500 years ago, and I'm pretty sure that's not right.

Lets use some logic. First, forage for smallmouth is a finite resource unless there is constant precipitation keeping the water high. When the river gets low the smallmouth have less food to eat and in a pure catch and release area there will be more fish. It seems easy to understand that if there are more fish in the same area that the fish will have less food and therefore be smaller. The thing to remember is smallmouth are not like trout, being that they do not travel miles up or downstream to find food. They usuall stay within 100yds of where they are born(this is according to a book I read over 10 years ago so whether or not it can be trusted is up to you).

As to the "muddy hole in the ground" I will say that when it comes to forage entering the pond it works much like the river. We have a 2.5 acre pond purpose built for bass fishing. 15ft max depth, trees, moss, and a wet weather creek that feeds it. We stocked 400 crappie, then the next year stocked 100 florida strain largemouth bass. Other than minnows nothing else has been put in. Within 4 years of stocking the pond we have caught numerous 6-8lb largemouths. Why? Because there are more predators(largemouth) than prey(crappie). The same principle applies to the river.

500 years ago I was not alive to know how big smallmouth bass in the buffalo river were, but I would bet they are the same or smaller than now due to overpopulation.

[Al Agnew]

Chief, I think there were others on the committee that liked the slot limit idea, but most felt that extending the existing special management area concept was an easier sell, rather than going a whole different direction.

About overpopulation of Ozark stream smallmouth...one of the things that MDC biologists looked at with their evaluation of the special management areas was whether the one fish limit would decrease growth rates. They found that there was a slight decrease, but not enough to be significant. There is no doubt that many Ozark streams have about as many smallmouth as they "need" to have, and there is no doubt that fewer fish would mean that the survivors would probably grow a little faster. However, it seems that the various interactions the smallies have with other predators in the streams is a lot more complex than the relatively simple ecology of a farm pond. More varieties of food, also more competition with other predators.

My thoughts on it are based upon what you see in the small to medium size streams, and that is a LOT of food. Huge schools of minnows, huge numbers of small sunfish, lots of crawdads, and a continually replenished supply of terrestrial food. I think there is enough food to go around on most streams. However, I can't avoid the fact that on some of these streams, a lot of smallies are long and lean.

I think that at one time on here I suggested my wish list of smallie regs, but I've been doing a lot of thinking on this and my present ideas might not match up completely with what I wanted before. The thing is, it's a very complex situation, with very different regulation requirements based upon size and characteristics of streams, interaction with other species, habitat differences, and what anglers want. And while it is impossible to come up with a one size fits all type of regulation that optimizes the angling experience, that is what the enforcement people at MDC and probably the average angler would like.

But let's look at some dividing lines in stream characteristics...

Size--I'd divide this up into these categories:

Large rivers, big enough to get extensive jet boat use, tournaments, and heavy fishing pressure from good anglers. I'd include the Gasconade below the mouth of the Big Piney, the Meramec below the mouth of the Huzzah, Black River below Clearwater Dam, Current River below Two Rivers, Eleven Point below Hwy. 160. These rivers, in my opinion, are our best potential big fish producers, and on most of them the smallie population is not over-abundant.

Medium-large rivers, big enough for jet boat use to be fairly common, but not necessarily year-round, with fewer or no tournaments. This is an arbitrary definition--for instance, the Current between Round Spring and Two Rivers certainly gets a lot of jet boat use, but fewer tournament anglers go up that far. These would include the Niangua below Bennett Spring, Gasconade between Hazelgreen and the Big Piney, Big River below the Mineral Fork, St. Francis below Sam A. Baker Park, Current between Round Spring and Two Rivers, James River below Finley Creek. On these streams the smallie population is often about as high as it needs to be, but size structure could stand improvement.

Medium-small rivers, big enough to be canoeable but not usually big enough for jet boats. These would include pretty much all stream sections in the MDC float book excluding the ones already mentioned. On most of them, the smallie population numbers are high, but again, size structure can be greatly improved. Fishing pressure is moderate to heavy on most of them.

Small creeks, at best marginally canoeable. These are the streams that have suffered the most from poor land use practices, otter predation, channelization (what I call recreational bulldozing), and gravel dredging. They vary widely in habitat and smallie numbers, but one thing they have in common is that they are fragile, and it doesn't take much catch and keep fishing to keep the population of adult fish depressed.

In addition, I'd further make special cases out of the southwest MO streams that are most likely to have smallies with a lot of Neosho genetics and slower growth with lower top end size. And I'd make special cases not only of the Meramec system but also the Gasconade system, putting both of them under the spotted bass regs that are now on the Meramec system.

So, just off the top of my head, here's what I'd like to see...

Large rivers--a 14-20 inch slot on smallies only, with two fish under and one over. Other black bass species would have a three fish/14 inch limit. Other than lower Current River, this would allow plenty of harvest while protecting the larger smallies. On lower Current River, smallmouth are by far the dominant species with relatively few largemouth and spots, so I'd adjust regs on it and possibly on the Eleven Point to allow one more smallie under the slot to be kept.

Medium-large rivers--maybe a 14-20 inch slot on largemouth and smallmouth, with 4 fish under and one over. Spotted bass, a 10 inch limit, 5 fish creel. It's not that I'm against spotted bass where they are native, but they don't have the growth potential of the other bass species and they spawn at 10 inches or less.

Medium-small rivers--14 to 18 inch slot, 4 under, one over on largemouth and smallmouth, same spotted bass regs as the medium-large rivers.

Small streams--three fish limit on all black bass species, 14 inch length limit. This would tend to protect these creeks from overharvest by a few meat fishermen.

In addition, I'd keep the spotted bass regs now existing over the Meramec system and extend them to the Gasconade system. And I'd put all the southwest MO streams under Chief's suggestion, 13-16 inch slot with 4 under, one over, on all black bass species.

At least that's my starting point. I'm sure few in MDC would go for that level of complexity in regs, but something like that is what I think would best maximize angling on all the streams.