Da Man. New Restrictions In The Onsr Being Mulled Over.

[Greasy B]

I received today a postcard in the mail on this. So I went and downloaded the document. Good grief - its 500 pages. Typical federal gubbamint, eh? Good lord. Then I figured someone on here had researched it and boiled it down for us. Thank you, Al!

Let me just say this.

Every time I go to either the Jacks or Current I am amazed and disappointed at how many more people I see and evidence OF people than the last time I was there. And I've been going for almost 30 years now.

The closing of these illegal roads and access points is absolutely necessary. The motorized boats above Akers, and above Eminence . . . . . those have all gotta go.

I like Plan A the best even though I don't think it goes far enough. I'd like to see daily admittance #'s capped and permits issued for overnight camping.

Plan B is the NPS's "preferred alternative". Preferred based on what? A blending of the public input they have received so far?? I don't like the suggestive wording of "preferred" at all. Its like they are trying to vote for us. Does it say anywhere in those 500 pages exactly what is meant by this?

I agree,

I started coming to these rivers for the party in the 70's and I returned for the natural beauty. Now both rivers are far from my top Ozark preferences when I seek beauty and solitude. When management agencies give three choices for the level of protection more often than not the status quo prevails. I have little hope things will improve and these wonderful rivers will remain something that I can only tolerate occasionally.

[Coldspring]

If they cap the numbers and you have to get reservations a year, or more, n advance for a specific weekend, something will come up or it will rain the entire weekend.

That is the goal of park service, to shut down the businesses of Shannon County. And, what will you do if park service administration targets you as a fisherman that is a consumptive user of their prescious biological resources and gives you a hard time about the reservation process?

[ColdWaterFshr]

That is the goal of park service, to shut down the businesses of Shannon County.

yes, something very dark and sinister is afoot. if these illegal roads and trails to littered gravel bars are shut down . . . . this could set Eminence back a hundred years or more . . . instead of being the year 1862, it would go back to 1762 and then where would I get gas for my Subaru when I'm in the area? I'd have to fill up in Salem?? or God forbid in Mountain View?? (Those are in Dent and Howell counties for those that don't know)

[SpoonDog]

If they cap the numbers and you have to get reservations a year, or more, n advance for a specific weekend, something will come up or it will rain the entire weekend.

That is the goal of park service, to shut down the businesses of Shannon County. And, what will you do if park service administration targets you as a fisherman that is a consumptive user of their prescious biological resources and gives you a hard time about the reservation process?

What businesses of Shannon County?

The purpose of ONSR is to protect the river, not protect the Eminence Chamber of Commerce. If local businesses hitched their wagon to the idea there's no limit to the number of floaters, boaters, or equestrians who can use the resource before doing damage- they were mistaken. Given the history of Shannon County it's a lesson which shouldn't be lost on the locals- Eminence is a classic example of the Ozark boomtown who's economy collapses once they've run out of trees to cut and rocks to mine. If your livelihood is dependent on the river, running it into the ground isn't a wise idea.

I agree with CW, something needs to be done- partly for aesthetics, partly for honest-to-goodness protection of the resource. I think the more restrictive options strike the right balance- and I say that knowing full well some of my favorite places may become tougher to get to. I haven't gone through the entire thing, but shuffling a few accesses, spreading folks out, closing some roads and horse trails, creating/redesignating some foot and mountain biking trails are all ideas I can get behind. And if they translate into a higher-quality experience, I'm all for it.

Oh. And they say they'll conduct more enforcement. It's in writing, so I'm sure it'll get done

[SpoonDog]

I agree,

I started coming to these rivers for the party in the 70's and I returned for the natural beauty. Now both rivers are far from my top Ozark preferences when I seek beauty and solitude. When management agencies give three choices for the level of protection more often than not the status quo prevails. A have little hope things will improve and these wonderful rivers will remain something that I can only tolerate occasionally.

Has to be a tough gig- threatened litigation from the granola crowd, histrionics from the locals. I'm hopeful something will change this go-round, if for no other reason than I'd think doing nothing leaves them vulnerable to ESA lawsuits over the hellbender.

[Al Agnew]

Well, it's not a "wilderness". It is more of a scenic easement. There are cabins that can be seen from the river, right up on park boundaries. Not including the Teacher's Assoc. camp. The river corridor on upper Jacks is 1/2 to mile wide, surrounded by homes, and timberland. Hwy 60 is not far. W/o being next to rippling water to mask the noise you get to enjoy the constant songs of lawnmowers, chainsaws, and semi-trucks on the highway.

One of my favorite opinions is from a local Sierra Clubber only minutes away from the river. I always find it amusing those that retire from other areas to a cheap piece of property in the area on a few acres and think they own the place and want to restrict others away. This person wants the plan that will close off the accesses and campgrounds on the upper Jacks. What would they stand to gain? Oh yeah, someone can drive them down to the Prongs and they can paddle through to Alley and not see anyone for a few days. That's great if you don't hunt, dayhike, or wadefish the area, and are only a few minutes drive. Closing off those accesses and roads will hurt other types of users than the overnight primitive camper floater royalex canoe/subaru driving types.

I personally think the upper Jacks is overfished. A moratorium on fishing for a few years would help it more than anything.

I hate to say this, but in my opinion what you just said is BS from start to finish.

The assertion that the Park Service wants to close the businesses of Shannon County is BS. The Park Service hasn't always been perfectly cooperative with those businesses, but they have done a reasonably good job of balancing the interests of those businesses with their mandate of protecting the river resources.

I am absolutely sure the Park Service has no plans to close the Buck Hollow access, the Blue Springs access, Rymers access, or Bay Creek access--in fact, the plans are to expand Blue Spring in some of the alternatives. Those are the established accesses on the upper river. It is entirely ridiculous to argue against closing all the little two track trails that give the ATVers the opportunity to drive their lazy butts in and litter up the gravel bars and poach a lot of the fish that you are so concerned about, and are impossible to police as long as those so-called accesses remain open.

I float the upper Jacks Fork every summer, when the water is too low for the liveries to put in canoes, so I have quite a bit of experience on this river. The canyon of the upper Jacks Fork is, on average, about two to three miles wide, and several hundred feet deep, and almost entirely wooded. The closest houses are cabins are a mile away from the river through a lot of thick woodland, except for the teachers' resort. Hwy. 60 is 4 miles away at Buck Hollow and steadily farther away as you go downstream--by the time you get to Rymers it's over five miles away. And again, since the canyon is pretty deep and heavily wooded, the sounds of Hwy. 60 seldom reach the river. In fact, I've NEVER heard the sounds of the highway once I got on the river, until I got well past Bay Creek when you begin hearing the sounds of Hwy. 106 occasionally. If you are hearing those highway sounds you've got LOTS better ears than mine. Other than the teachers' resort, I know of no cabins that are close to the river. There is no bottomland, and certainly no cleared bottom fields, along the river between Buck Hollow and Bay Creek. NO OTHER STREAM IN MISSOURI HAS THOSE CHARACTERISTICS. They give the illusion of wilderness, even though, as you say, civilization isn't far away. On no other stream is there this potential opportunity to give the visitor that kind of experience, where there are NO obvious signs of human habitation except at the accesses and the teachers' resort, which takes up about a quarter mile of the total mileage.

In all the years I've floated that stretch, I've never heard sounds of human activity away from the accesses except for a bit of motor noise coming from one or another of the roads that come close to the canyon rim, and those noises were faint...except for the times when some nimrod on an ATV comes buzzing out onto a gravel bar, or the one year when some doofus pulled a big camping trailer out onto a gravel bar halfway between Bay Creek and Alley, or when another doofus drove up the road heading upstream from Bay Creek and tried to cross the river at the end of it. Not only that, but by mid-summer it's far too low for the jetboaters to even think about running it. Of course it's not true wilderness, but it's far closer to wilderness than any other stream in Missouri, or it would be if those two track trails were closed for good.

I'm one of those Royalex canoe types, and I even drive a Prius (horrors) though I don't use it to drive my canoes to the river. I also hunt and fish and own a jetboat and am a native Ozarker. As nice as they are, rivers where you're always next to a cow pasture on one side and a cabin on the other, with jetboats buzzing and ATVs tearing up the gravel bars and the occasional pig farm adding odors are a dime a dozen in the Ozarks. There is only one upper Jacks Fork, and it should be treasured for its uniqueness, not allowed to suffer the ills of all those other rivers.

By the way...fishing. If you can't catch smallmouth and goggle-eye by the bunches on the upper Jacks Fork, you ain't much of a fisherman. Yes, it's not as good as it was about 5 or 10 years ago, but since it already has a one fish 18 inch limit on the smallmouth, it's not legal angling pressure that is making the fishing decline, it's all those two track trails that let the pinheads in far from the accesses so that they can kill whatever they wish with no regard to limits and no worries of being caught.

[jdmidwest]

I have always preferred rivers with 2 track trails to it instead of pavement and boat ramps. They seem to be more private and lesser traveled.

[ColdWaterFshr]

I have always preferred rivers with 2 track trails to it instead of pavement and boat ramps. They seem to be more private and lesser traveled.

Huh? Not the point. We're not talking about some super remote river in Saskatchewan. The Jacks and Current don't need more roads of any kind, paved or unpaved, and particularly the illegal kind made by ATVS and Billy-bob in his Jeep with muddin' tires.

[SpoonDog]

I have always preferred rivers with 2 track trails to it instead of pavement and boat ramps. They seem to be more private and lesser traveled.

And when presented with the offer on the table- between two tracks and no tracks- I prefer the latter.

[Coldspring]

I float the upper Jacks Fork every summer, when the water is too low for the liveries to put in canoes, so I have quite a bit of experience on this river. The canyon of the upper Jacks Fork is, on average, about two to three miles wide, and several hundred feet deep, and almost entirely wooded. The closest houses are cabins are a mile away from the river through a lot of thick woodland, except for the teachers' resort. Hwy. 60 is 4 miles away at Buck Hollow and steadily farther away as you go downstream--by the time you get to Rymers it's over five miles away. And again, since the canyon is pretty deep and heavily wooded, the sounds of Hwy. 60 seldom reach the river. In fact, I've NEVER heard the sounds of the highway once I got on the river, until I got well past Bay Creek when you begin hearing the sounds of Hwy. 106 occasionally. If you are hearing those highway sounds you've got LOTS better ears than mine. Other than the teachers' resort, I know of no cabins that are close to the river. There is no bottomland, and certainly no cleared bottom fields, along the river between Buck Hollow and Bay Creek. NO OTHER STREAM IN MISSOURI HAS THOSE CHARACTERISTICS. They give the illusion of wilderness, even though, as you say, civilization isn't far away. On no other stream is there this potential opportunity to give the visitor that kind of experience, where there are NO obvious signs of human habitation except at the accesses and the teachers' resort, which takes up about a quarter mile of the total mileage.

In all the years I've floated that stretch, I've never heard sounds of human activity away from the accesses except for a bit of motor noise coming from one or another of the roads that come close to the canyon rim, and those noises were faint...except for the times when some nimrod on an ATV comes buzzing out onto a gravel bar, or the one year when some doofus pulled a big camping trailer out onto a gravel bar halfway between Bay Creek and Alley, or when another doofus drove up the road heading upstream from Bay Creek and tried to cross the river at the end of it. Not only that, but by mid-summer it's far too low for the jetboaters to even think about running it. Of course it's not true wilderness, but it's far closer to wilderness than any other stream in Missouri, or it would be if those two track trails were closed for good.

There are cabins within a half mile of Jam Up, a lot of them. There are 50 different property owners within a mile radius of there. It's only 3 miles from Hwy 60. The canyon is only 300 feet elevation in depth from river surface to ridgetops, and 1/2 mile wide at tops.

I can hear pretty well because I have big-lobed hillbilly ears, and listen. There are some quieter areas on past the teacher's camp though, when you don't have to listen to chainsaws. Powerline costs and good roads are keeping that area from developing as fast.

It