Public access on rivers in MO?

[Fish Bork]

Just a little question to help with my thesis. Do you guys feel there is quality fishing at public access points here in the Ozarks, Ex James River, or do you use these access points to get to another spot on the river, wading or canoe?

[Wayne SW/MO]

FB, I don't know how we can hope to enjoy the flows in this state, or to recruit people who will be willing to protect them, if we can't maintain free access.

Yes, I fish a lot and 100% of it requires public access, and alot of my fishing is on flows, in fact probably 75% is on flows.

[Al Agnew]

I know a lot of people say that the farther you go from a public access, the better the fishing is. However, that's not really been my experience. I'm just about as likely to catch fish near an access as I am farther away from it. Probably as much as anything it depends on the habitat. If you've got good habitat near an access, it'll have fish.

A few examples...there is a 10 mile stretch of river that I float a lot. Access at the put-in is difficult, there is no public access in the middle of it, and the access at the take-out is a popular state park. I've caught more 18 inch plus smallmouths in the one mile stretch of river that runs through the park than I have at any other 1 mile stretch of that float.

There is an MDC access on the same river, boat ramp, popular. The boat ramp happens to be on a nice pool. In the winter, I've caught more bass out of that pool than any other pool within 10 miles either way.

Seems to me that most people who concentrate their fishing right around public accesses are not fishing for bass, and a lot of them aren't knowledgeable anglers. Also, it could very well be that the meat hogs who are killing more fish than the law allows, either keeping undersize fish, keeping more than their limit, fishing out of season, gigging game fish...probably get far enough away from the access that they feel safe before engaging in their illegal activities.