Fish Per Mile

[dennis boatman]

Has anyone ever heard of how many trout per mile the Niangua may have? I was reading where Hot Creek, in California had approx. 10,000 per mile. I remember that creek when I was a kid and it was full of fish. I know that is way above an average for a stream, and was just wondering of our local rivers, espcecially the Niangua. Hot Creek is interesting...it has hot springs mixing with melting snow and half of the creek is warm while the other is cold. They do mix together, but for quite a stretch, there is a definite division between warm and cold. the warm side is full of weeds, and I assume some type of crustaceans are in there and that's why there is such an abundance of trout...I never caught a fish there as a kid...

[fishinwrench]

You don't wanna know, trust me. Hearing that there are umpteen thousand trout per mile just makes you feel worse when you have a slow day. LOL

Nothing worse than having to trudge 2 miles upstream back to your truck thinking.... "geeze, I suck! "

[dennis boatman]

...been there done that...

[FishinCricket]

There are around 3 or 4 decent sized holes per mile from Bennett to Barclay.. I'd guess there are anywhere from 10 to 100 trout per hole (plus smallies, greenies and gogglies)...

Good luck!

[ozark trout fisher]

Has anyone ever heard of how many trout per mile the Niangua may have? I was reading where Hot Creek, in California had approx. 10,000 per mile. I remember that creek when I was a kid and it was full of fish. I know that is way above an average for a stream, and was just wondering of our local rivers, espcecially the Niangua. Hot Creek is interesting...it has hot springs mixing with melting snow and half of the creek is warm while the other is cold. They do mix together, but for quite a stretch, there is a definite division between warm and cold. the warm side is full of weeds, and I assume some type of crustaceans are in there and that's why there is such an abundance of trout...I never caught a fish there as a kid...

10,000 per mile is exceptional...Wow. The only other stream I've heard of with a fish count anywhere near that high is the Green in Utah. I'll have to fish there sometime.

As a point of reference, depending on the year the Blue Ribbon stretch of the Current usually is estimated by the MDC to have somewhere between 300 and 500 trout per mile. The Eleven Point usually has 800-1200, which is comparable to some of the famous streams out west. The Eleven Point is a big river though, at least compared to other Missouri trout streams. The Meramec is a little lower than either one, I think the last count turned up something like 290 per mile, although it has been as high as 700 per mile in the past. I don't know too much about the Niangua but based on what I hear, I'd guess that the average fish count would probably be similar to the Meramec, maybe around 300 per mile or somewhat less. I would also guess that since the Niangua is White Ribbon, the fish count would vary wildly based on when the last stocking was, and how close to a stocking point you are.

But numbers, as important as they seem, don't matter as much as it's possible to expect. They say that just about all of the wild trout streams I fish have less than 100 trout per mile, but still if you know where to look you'd never think that there was any shortage of fish. 1000 per mile can be very little on a big river like the Clark Fork in Montana, where there is a whole lot of good habitat for the fish to spread out in. But in a stream where the fish are concentrated into a small number of good lies, as few as 70 or 100 fish per mile can be plenty.

[dennis boatman]

300 per mile sounds like a good estimate...On average I catch about 1 fish per hour...I rarely catch more than one fish out of hole...I still prefer this river for trout...you have to really work for your fish, and makes you appreciate it when you get to "real" trout water...

[Wayne SW/MO]

I know there is never enough. A lot of the good trout cover has been covered by gravel and I don't know if this reduces their numbers or concentrates them?