Trash

[kevthebassman]

Ban drunkenness and the consumption of alcohol on the public waterways. You can't be drunk and drive a car, and I'm pretty sure you can't operate a bicycle on the road while intoxicated, so you needn't have a motor involved to be ticketed on the roads.

It isn't often I come out in favor of banning something, but when folks make a habit of becoming obnoxiously, dangerously drunk in a public area, they ought to be fined and/or jailed. Go get drunk in a tavern or at home, and save yourself the rental fee.

[Brian Jones]

It is a shame that so many of today's problems could be solved by a good dose of common sense and how so few people have it anymore.

[ozark trout fisher]

I won't apologize for what I do because I enjoy it and enjoy providing an affordable vacation for families and groups of friends that are out to have a good time. I am fully a contributor to the noise and congestion on the river on Saturdays on the NFoW. If I wasn't I probably would have been in an office today instead of in front of my house fishing.

Come to this river any day other than 15 saturdays in the summer and you more than likely will have a wonderful experience, if you go up on the 8:00 shuttle you can even get ahead of all the drunks and basically have the river to yourself all day even on a Saturday. Church groups and scout troops come year after year on the weekends to stay in our campground because we try our best to keep it family oriented and they know to go early to avoid the partiers on the river.

Since I have never seen the craziness of a weekend on the Niangua, Elk, Current, or Meremec I can't really speak for the party rivers, but do your research, go to the right river and a good time can be had even on Saturdays in the summer.

And yes, just look at the vehicles at our public accesses and tons of locals have their own canoes and shuttle themselves and some get drunk and disorderly and then drive home. At least we drive our patrons back to their campsite where they hopefully passout.

We are limited to 120 canoes which we can put in at Hammond and on our river all of our outfitters don't rent as many boats combined as just NRO on the Niangua does.

Maybe I went a little overboard in my post as I tend to do on occasion...And I'm not asking you to apologize.

In any case, I don't know much about the NFoW, maybe these things aren't such a big problem there. But when you go down to the Current River, or the Niangua, or the lower Jack's, or the Meramec anytime during the summer (even on a weekday) you would almost have to admit that something is broken. When the river appears as a theme park, and it's bumper boats for as far as the eye can see in any direction just about every day from Memorial Day to Labor Day, then something needs to be done in my opinion. I know these rivers, especially the ones in ONSR have restrictions on the amount of canoes rentals can put on the river, but they just are not stringent enough. The atmosphere on these rivers are being ruined for three+ months out of the year and it isn't doing any good for the ecosystem either, having so much trash thrown around by so many people.

I know a good time can be had during summer weekends. I am lucky that my favorite (warm-water) floating stream is thought of as marginal, no one seems to like it much, and it only has one canoe rental that services a stretch of river about 50 miles upstream from where I like to fish. Actually this is precisely why it's my favorite river. But the fact still remains that the vast numbers of canoes being put on almost all of our cream of the crop rivers narrows options incredibly for those of us who are out there to fish, and have a relatively quiet, relaxing time on the river. Our rivers should be places where both the party crowd, and fisherman (as well as people who are out there to enjoy the scenery and wildlife) should be able to get something close to what they want out of the experience. With a little more respect from the party crowd things could be better than they are now. Not that I'm holding breath or anything.

[Justin Spencer]

I fully understand what everyone is saying about the problems caused by lots of floaters hitting the rivers all at once. Same problems happen in National Parks more due to crowding than being drunk and disorderly. We took the kids to Smoky Mtn. NP last spring and I would choose not to take them in the summertime due to the crowds. I enjoyed growing up floating ozark streams and not until my 20's did I realize how crazy they could get. My parents chose to take us before memorial day or after labor day to avoid the partiers. The simple fact is there are too many people in the world and floating is a fun cheap way to enjoy the outdoors and party responsibly without getting in trouble (unfortunatley many don't get in trouble who should). This summer with the economy like it was there were more locals shuttling themselves than ever, and we are getting more calls about selling old boats than ever before. Rivers are going to continue to get busier, but luckily for fishermen that are willing to do some research and scouting you can have some outstanding fishing in the summertime even on Saturdays without having to deal with the crowds(call me and I can give you some suggestions). Wait until school starts to hit the busy stretches of the party rivers if that is where the best fishing is.

We can either shut the public waterways down to all people, or continue things like they are. In a free society we don't get to pick and choose who's activities are more important.

[ozark trout fisher]

We can either shut the public waterways down to all people, or continue things like they are.

No, it's not that simple. There's usually a middle ground, and this case is no exception. I'm suggesting is that canoe rentals should be somewhat more limited in the number of canoes they can put on the river. I think that even relatively small reductions in the number of boats rentals can put on the river would make a better experience for everyone. I have no desire to see any canoe rentals shut down or put out of business, but I also don't want to see them ruining the very rivers they depend on for their livelihood. I am not implicating you Justin, I have not heard that the North Fork is among the worst aluminum hatch rivers. But their are some rivers that really are being kind of ruined, and at least some small steps to alleviate the numbers of people abusing these rivers are in order.

[Justin Spencer]

I think limits can be set also and they are on some rivers, but with numerous put ins and takeouts it would be a nightmare to enforce. If you do this however then every river that has halfway decent floating will fill with canoes as those turned away from the "full" rivers will go elsewhere, this already happens when certain rivers are flooded. We would see rentals return to Bryant Creek and others that currently don't have commercial operations.

I will once again say if you don't like the crowds avoid those rivers and go elsewhere, we are free to choose what experience we wish to have. When you go to dinner with your family you can choose to take them to Hooters, McDonalds, Applebee's, or the local diner. Every choice has good points (example hooters and nice boobs) and bad points (McDonalds and being fat).

On the big party rivers I don't think small steps would make much difference, sounds like their numbers need to be cut in half or more.

The best solution is more officers to patrol the waterways and hand out tickets or haul people to jail.

[David Unnerstall]

You know, my father was part of the WWII generation. He and my uncles thought nothing of throwing their Hyde Park beer cans on the ground. No one, then, thought anything about. Then came the "ecology movement" and the Iron Eyes Cody "crying Indian" commercial and we all woke up. But it seems the next generation is going back to those ways. I observed a young kid who was a friend-of-a-friend.... throw an empty beer can on a bank during a float on the Castor River a couple of years ago. I can't alter his behavior any other time but I made sure that was the last beer can thrown on that particular day.

[ozark trout fisher]

I will once again say if you don't like the crowds avoid those rivers and go elsewhere, we are free to choose what experience we wish to have. When you go to dinner with your family you can choose to take them to Hooters, McDonalds, Applebee's, or the local diner. Every choice has good points (example hooters and nice boobs) and bad points (McDonalds and being fat).

I can only say that this analogy just seems completely off base. We are talking about rivers, a natural resource, which, depending on your belief either God created or came into being through the forces of geology and hydrology over thousands and/or millions of years.Doesn't matter which of those views you ascribe to, either way, our rivers are a whole lot more sacred than anything established by man. They deserve some preservation and some protection from abuse of the multitudes who see the river as nothing more than a place to party and throw their beer cans. Even if they did not ruin the experience for fisherman and wildlife watchers and lovers of nature, our rivers deserve protection in their own right, as valuable ecoystems that should be respected, and not trashed in the way many of them are now.

[Justin Spencer]

Next time it floods come look at the river, it removes all traces of what the floaters have done, and deposits big stuff that come from personal dumps. In one of my earlier posts I suggested that landowner practices hurt the rivers and their ecosystems, I have a hard time seeing what the floaters do as actually hurting the river, it hurts the rivers charm for sure. Rivers should be protected, and logging, overgrazing, planting fields where forests once served as sponges, and then pouring chemicals on them all hurt the rivers and their ecosystems, but do beer cans really hurt the river. I have never seen a beer can wrapped around a turtle, or bird, but have seen several with fishing line wrapped all over them.

I don't see anyone up in arms about logging or fertilizing or grazing or farming in individual watersheds and I guarantee this hurts river systems much more than partying and littering on a river does. Using floaters in the river preservation arguement sinks with me.

[Guest]

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