Free Flowing Stream Conservation Thread

[Gavin]

Think I know that gravel bar on the Huzzah...used to be a good spot till they skimmed it..now its a treeless gravel bar about the size of a football field with a few little doze piles near the tree line.

There are lots of threats most stem from gravel mining, development, poor agricultural practices, and some suffer from excessive human use. Each stream is different...

[Smalliebigs]

Al, I couldn't agree with you more about the Gravel mining thing. I realize I'm partial to this opinion because it is directly effecting me right now on Brazil Creek. I just wish some of you guys could have seen what the creek was like before the aholes upsteam started harvesting gravel and what it has become.It's sick and disgraceful, It makes me actualy wimper and cry at times. That creek use to have beautiful holes some were over six feet deep and it meandered thru the valley with twists and turns.Now it is straight and about a foot to two feet deep it gets me so pissed thinking about it...I'm sure my blood pressure gets to dangerous levels. That beeing said the nieghboring property owner has be urging me to sell our land to him for the last ten years and the Brazil situation is one of the factors that is making me consider his lucrative offer.I have contacted the DNR and I think they may be under maned right now???? because their responses are really non existant.I have seen what Al is talking about as well with some of my nieghbors trying to do what they think is the best thing for the Meramec and the Brazil with their machinery.The gravel has piled up at the confluence of the two streams and guys around us take their bobcats and medium sized bulldozers and remove the gravel and other obstuctions that they think are impeading the flow of the creek???? This behavior is all in hopes of improving the creek but, as Al said the creek will repair itself enventually if left alone. Water will alway take the path of least resistance, the grade of the valley will use gravity and inertia to create a natural channel. Sometimes I stand at the mouth of Brazil Creek at the Meramec and look like the Indian in the old public service commercials from the 70's about littering, I shed a tear and go back inside and go drink a ton of Pinot Noir to drown my misery. It's really a shame because I'm not sure how much longer I will be paying Crawford county property taxes. I think it's time to move on and find another river property.

Oh the other things that face Smallies in my opinion are people keeping them and eating them....they are the most watery, bland meat you can eat.....go eat some crappie. there easy to catch and reproduce like pigs.

[Smalliebigs]

Think I know that gravel bar on the Huzzah...used to be a good spot till they skimmed it..now its a treeless gravel bar about the size of a football field with a few little doze piles near the tree line.

There are lots of threats most stem from gravel mining, development, poor agricultural practices, and some suffer from excessive human use. Each stream is different...

I also know the exact gravel bar and area you are talking about....my buddy was wondering what happened there as he caught one of his biggest smallies ever in the hole past the gravel bar....there are pepole who notice these things Al, but sometimes it seems kinda hopeless to try to do anything about it .....I hate to sound so pesimistic. I said this before and I hate saying it but sometimes I feel like I better get in as much Smallie action in while I can before man screws up every creek and river to the point of no return in my lifetime. On a happier note time to go down town to the game....the St.Louis holiday is upon us.....Go Cards

[Tim Smith]

I agree with gravel and the rest but here's an entry that may catch some by surprise. Recent experiences have really put this into perspective for me...

1. Economic security. I had done a small data analysis of the effect of some parks and regulations on Belizean commercial species. Just prior to the economic downturn things weren't perfect, but there were some hopeful trends and the future looked pretty good. Now, probably as a result of the economic downturn and the slow economy, most of the parks in Belize are showing steep declines in commercial species, probably as a result of poaching.

The fact that we have fish in our rivers depends very much on the fact that most people in the US don't HAVE to go to the river to find something to eat or abuse it through damaging short-cuts in development.

[jdmidwest]

Having dealt with the "gravel" problem for years on the creek that runs thru the property, I am at a loss at what would be the best solution. We have let the county "gravel skim" the area for all of my life. It just comes back, from upstream. The problem is that alot of the ground upstream is pastured to the edge of the stream with little treeline along the creeks that fork into one at the upper end of the property. The one fork was involved in a large timber clear cut 15 years ago and most of the gravel seems to come from that side. The other side is getting a pretty good riparian corridor along it along with a good meander and it is shaping up pretty well with nice hole forming. I vote trees and lots of them.

[ozark trout fisher]

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.

[Guest]

This is a bigtime problem,

However it's much like the global warming debate.

Climates and floods are cyclical..

Floods, erosion, more floods, more erosion, trash, cattle, gravel mining, hell whatever else.

It keeps on going,

Its crazy, but these rivers are very resilient

Its funny to me, that most of my best spots have filled in just 3 years.

After a dozen of those 100 year flood events, some of the holes have opened up again.

There seems to be a huge "plug" of gravel shifting down our streams, it never ends.

I hope the next flood resurrects one of those honey holes this year.

It's a "new" river after each flood.

[Al Agnew]

I agree with gravel and the rest but here's an entry that may catch some by surprise. Recent experiences have really put this into perspective for me...

1. Economic security. I had done a small data analysis of the effect of some parks and regulations on Belizean commercial species. Just prior to the economic downturn things weren't perfect, but there were some hopeful trends and the future looked pretty good. Now, probably as a result of the economic downturn and the slow economy, most of the parks in Belize are showing steep declines in commercial species, probably as a result of poaching.

The fact that we have fish in our rivers depends very much on the fact that most people in the US don't HAVE to go to the river to find something to eat or abuse it through damaging short-cuts in development.

Excellent point, Tim...and there's more to it than just people "needing" to harvest fish. This is skirting politics pretty close, but right now, with the great recession, the political climate is such that energy development and economic development are all-important and environmental protection is getting little but negative attention. And with the budget cutting going on, environmental inspection and enforcement is taking a huge hit, because staff is being cut. The MO DNR has always had a lack of inspection personnel...at the time I was on the gravel mining task force, there were only five people in DNR for the whole state that had responsibility for inspecting and investigating gravel mining. I'll bet there are fewer than that now. So Smalliebigs, you're probably right, they just don't have anybody to do anything about the Brazil Creek problems.

[Al Agnew]

Having dealt with the "gravel" problem for years on the creek that runs thru the property, I am at a loss at what would be the best solution. We have let the county "gravel skim" the area for all of my life. It just comes back, from upstream. The problem is that alot of the ground upstream is pastured to the edge of the stream with little treeline along the creeks that fork into one at the upper end of the property. The one fork was involved in a large timber clear cut 15 years ago and most of the gravel seems to come from that side. The other side is getting a pretty good riparian corridor along it along with a good meander and it is shaping up pretty well with nice hole forming. I vote trees and lots of them.

Problem is that with the American "philosophy" of private property rights, nobody accepts being told what to do with their property. And when you talk about problems like gravel in the streams, it's a watershed-wide problem. What one person does on their own property has the potential to affect many other landowners downstream, but they can't be told not to do it. And the only way to really stop the continuing problems with gravel filling in the streams is to stop all the horrible land use practices all over the watershed. So I'm like you...I don't know what a workable solution would be. But I do know that digging the gravel out is a temporary fix at best, and usually does more harm than good.

[Justin Spencer]

I think logging (no matter where in the watershed) probably has one of the biggest impacts on the streams and rivers of the watershed. Logging increases runoff and erosion leading to more and bigger floods, more dirt and gravel entering the streams, and less filtering of the water that does enter the rivers. Having been here for 8 years I watch good stands of forest being knocked down every year and turned into fescue pasture for cattle. Logging can be done responsibly and forests allowed to regenerate, but it seems like more often than not when land is logged it is then turned to pasture. I think this also aids in the topic that shall not be mentioned as well.