No Fish, But Good Day On The Middle Meramec

[mic]

Friday, I floated the Meramec from Blue Springs to Sappington Bridge; my first time on this stretch.. I couldn't buy a bite, but after being stuck in the house and work for over a month, it didn't matter. I simply had a blast. A positive about not having a clue is low expectations. I used Three Rivers Canoe Rental. He only had metal canoes, but a really nice guy.

River was up from its normal flow (985 cfs), and I had the wind in my back so I barely had to paddle even in the pools. Matter of fact there were a few times where I was trying to figure out how to slow down and couldn't. I tried a few things (Rapalas, Jigs, X-raps), but by the end of the day I was just slinging and floating a woolly bugger under a weighted float at any dead water or eddies I could find. I still have no clue what I'm doing so I wasn't expecting much.

Question 1, when I'm in the pools, do you fish the middle of the river or the sides (this time of year). I was in the middle slinging at any structure on the back out to 10 feet. If there wasn't any structure, I just twitched the float.

Question 2, in the spring when water temps are up...and the water is that high and moving, will there be smallies in the pools? There seemed to be a lot of chunk rock in that area.

[405z06]

The nice weather Saturday had me thinking about it, but the water temps were probably still in the mid-30's at best, so I decided to sit this one out.

[mic]

Personally, I think you missed out. Great day to be on the water fishing or no fishing.

C'est la vie though.

[Al Agnew]

With the water temps still as cold as they likely are, most of the fish will be in water that is VERY slow. But they won't necessarily be in the deepest water. Depending upon how clear the water is, they can be anywhere that's deep enough to obscure the bottom. When it's REALLY clear and you can't hardly find any water deep enough to hide the bottom, they'll usually be in and around heavy cover like big rocks or logs that they can get UNDER. So keeping that in mind, on those rocky banks, the fish could be anywhere from a few feet off the bank to out where the rocks meet the gravelly bottom in the deeper parts of the pool. By fishing from close to the bank out to about 10-15 feet off the bank, you should have been putting the lure in front of some fish. They may be out in the middle of the pool, or even on some kind of subtle structure on the other side if there's some depth, but unless you know the river well, finding those kinds of spots can be very difficult, so on a strange river in the winter when you have to be fairly precise with where you put your lure, it probably makes more sense to fish the areas you were fishing, rather than looking for harder to find spots elsewhere.

Just keep in mind that in water as cold as it is now, it's tough unless you know the pools you are fishing VERY well. The fish won't move far to take your lure; you practically have to bump them with it. With the river flowing at that level, however, it actually can make it a little easier to find some fish, because there will be fewer spots in really slow current in which to search for them.

In higher and warmer spring water levels, the fish can be just about anywhere. I've caught them in odd places like shallowly submerged willows on the edges of gravel bars, and I've caught them along the banks in deep, slow water. But at least then, you can fish a little faster and cover more water.

[mic]

Thanks Al. Seems like I was doing what I could short of bouncing the jig on the bottom.

[LarrySTL]

Just an FYI regarding water temps, Saturday afternoon I dunked a water thermometer in the lower Meramec, call it in the general area of Fenton in some shallow slack water. 41 degrees late in the afternoon on a very warm day, so you can bet it was in the 30s earlier in the day, let alone earlier in the week.

[Haris122]

I headed out that Saturday for a little bit myself, on the Meramec near Hwy 21. Caught nothing and saw nothing. Water was rising and getting dingy there too though.