Fishing report 7-10-06

[riverrat]

Floated from Riddle Bridge to Hwy 28 on Monday. The distance of this float is 10.5 miles, the shuttle is 6.5 -7 miles. The river was low, but I think that has changed now. The weather started out cloudy then it started raining and raining and raining-had to empty the boat 3 times. Don't get me wrong I'm not complaining, I would much rather fish in the rain in July than 95 temps and the sun blaring down. Besides that the river needs the water and my fish friends sure need it. The fishing was only fair with most being caught on the buzzbait. Caught several on a fluke. Can't really use bottom bouncing baits because of the distance of the floats, but thats ok I really don't enjoy using them as much. The numbers are only estimates- about 60 bass between my buddy and me. Only about half were smallies-way too many Kentuckies in a SMB management area. The largest smallmouth was 15" -3 of them. The river was still clear when we took out. Passed over the Big and Little Piney on the way home. Both were very muddy.

[Phil Lilley]

Steve Brigman is floating the Gasconade all this week and will write about the trip for the NewsLeader. Should be interesting.

[riverrat]

I see the river came up 6' at Hazelgreen. Hope he didn't do anything dangerous.

[Wayne SW/MO]

RR, did you catch any hybrids?

[riverrat]

I caught 1 that I'm pretty sure was a hybrid. I didn't mean to imply that half of the bass were spots only about 10 out of 60. We caught a lot of largemouths in the eddies. I have noticed that the higher on the Gasconade I fish, the fewer spots I catch. Have you caught many above Hwy 7? Reading about the spots on the Meremac has me alarmed. Have we permantly damaged prime smallmouth habitat?

[Wayne SW/MO]

I haven't caught any above 44, but that still doesn't mean much because I just don't get over there like I did in years past.

I think the big unanswered question is whether their expansion is part of a cycle, or a permanent change. Kentucky/Spots are native, so it has to be an environmental change. I have a feeling that a lot of it is the fact that the rivers are becoming more shallow and consequently warmer.

[Al Agnew]

Wayne, spotted bass are NOT native to the Gasconade. Until about 20 years ago, there were none in either the Gasconade or the Meramec river systems. And yes, they did colonize both rivers from the downstream ends, so it makes sense that the farther downstream you go, the more spotted bass. And yes, be VERY alarmed, because I suspect that given the habitat in the Gasconade, spotted bass will eventually colonize the whole river, to the great detriment of smallmouths.

The situation on the Gasconade parallels that of the Meramec, which I am very familiar with since I've fished the Meramec river system all my life. I first started seeing spotted bass in the Meramec river in the area downstream from St. Clair in the mid-1980s. They showed up on the lower portion of Big River, below the lowest mill dam, about the same time, and also on the Bourbeuse below the Guths Mill dam. The Bourbeuse and Big River were perfect habitat for them, and in a matter of 10 years they had moved up Big River a good 50 miles, and the Bourbeuse about 35 miles. And in those stretches, they quickly became the dominant bass species. Now, they have colonized over 100 miles of Big River, and are starting to show up in heavy numbers 80 miles up the Bourbeuse. In the Meramec itself, the habitat wasn't quite so perfect for them, and they seem to have reached an equilibrium with the smallmouths in the area between Meramec State Park and the mouth of the Bourbeuse, with just small populations upstream (the Meramec is apparently just cool enough to discourage them a bit, being more heavily springfed than Big River or the Bourbeuse).

I'm hoping that the springs in the middle portion of the Gasconade might keep it cool enough to control their population, and also that the Big Piney is heavily springfed enough to discourage them. But I'm afraid it's a forlorn hope on the Gasconade.

The Niangua below Bennett Spring was pretty much spotted bass free for many years, even though there is a large population in Lake of the Ozarks, because Bennett kept it too cool. I haven't been on the Niangua in several years...I hope it's still that way.

So where did they come from if they weren't native to these streams? First possibility...we know that somebody stocked them in Lake of the Ozarks many years ago. We don't know who or when, but they were not native to the Osage river system. They could have come from there, moving downstream through the Osage to the Missouri, then up the Gasconade and Meramec. Second possibility...MDC misguidedly stocked them in a number of streams that ran into the Missouri River from the north, thinking that they would be a good game fish in streams that were too muddy for smallmouths. They could have come down those streams, into the Missouri, etc. Third possibility, and this is my own theory but I think it's the most likely one...spotted bass ARE native to Ozark streams flowing south, including the Castor River in southeast Missouri. The Castor used to flow far down through the flat land into Arkansas before entering the Mississippi. But back around 1900, the Diversion Channel was built to drain the swamps of the bootheel, and it diverted the Castor to where it flows directly into the Mississippi just south of Cape Girardeau. So the spotted bass had a direct route into the Mississippi, not far from where other Ozark streams flow into it. However, they probably couldn't use this route because the Mississippi was too polluted, and too muddy. But...then the big reservoirs were built on the upper Missouri in the Dakotas, which cut its sediment load to a fraction of what it once was, and thus made the Mississippi a lot less muddy as well. And...the Clean Water Act came along, and the Mississippi got a lot less polluted as well. It's no coincidence, I don't think, that spotted bass showed up first in Apple Creek, the farthest south Ozark stream entering the Mississippi (above Cape Girardeau), in the early 1970s. Then they showed up in Saline Creek, the next one to the north, in the late 1970s. Then in Joachim Creek, the next one to the north, in the early 1980s. And finally, in the Meramec, the next and last Ozark tributary of the Mississippi, in the mid-1980s. Did they move up the Missouri to the Gasconade? Maybe not. Maybe the Gasconade fish came from one of the other two scenarios. It would be interesting to do a genetic study of spotted bass from the various river systems.

Ironic, though, that it very well could be that dams built two or three states away, a swamp-draining project built a century ago, and a landmark pollution control law, could have together spelled doom for what was probably the best big smallmouth fisheries in Missouri (Big River and the Bourbeuse), and maybe doom as well for the other two best big smallie fisheries (Meramec and Gasconade).

[riverrat]

Has anyone ever heard of MDC stocking smallmouth in streams? I've always read that smallmouth weren't stocked because the numbers were much more dependent on the success of the spawn. I found out today that in 2004 MDC stocked 22,000 on the Gasconade in eastern Pulaski and western Phelps Counties. This is exactly the area of this float. If anyone is interested, tomorrow I find out why.

[Wayne SW/MO]

Thats a surprise. I've always heard that they had no success in stocking them in rivers, so they quit.

[riverrat]

I got my answer on smallmouth bass stocking this morning. I must say everyone I talked to at MDC was very helpful in tracking down this answer. They were doing a study on smallmouth spawning and returned the brood stock to the river and instead of wasting the fry they brought them along.