A few days in the Ozarks

[ozark trout fisher]

I was lucky to get the chance to spend a few days exploring some new water in the Ozarks this past week, and I'm just now getting around to writing it up...because honestly, nothing all that interesting happened. Still, I fished a few Ozark streams  and ponds and I figured I ought to post it here.

Wednesday afternoon I made my way down to a small stream deep in the Ozarks that if you're like me, you've probably heard of, but never thought much about. The downsides are obvious-it's just about too small to float, has very spotty public access, and there are a lot of better smallmouth streams within a stones throw. But it's also spring-fed, crystal clear, and drop-dead beautiful. And not a lot of people fish it.

I made my way to one of the few legal access points. Right at the access there was a deep, pretty hole that I had to cast to before wading in. First cast with a Ned Rig yielded an 11 inch smallie, which got my expectations higher than they probably should have been. After that, I proceeded to fish lovely, deep pool after lovely, deep pool, and....not a whole lot happened. The smallies were in there, and I fooled a few of them, but even as I got quite a ways from the parking lot, the fishing just never took off. That 11 incher would be the biggest fish off the day. Sometimes searching out a creek like this leads you to finding an amazing, hidden gem, and sometimes it makes you realize why those famous rivers nearby are famous in the first place. This would be the latter.

I wasn't able to fish on Thursday, but got back after it on Friday. I started off at an access on the far upper reaches of the Meramec, well above Maramec Spring. The river is a small, wadeable stream in that area, and I thought since it was still early in the day on Friday I might get some water to myself. Or at least a pool or two.

...Not so much.

Between swimmers and my fellow anglers, who were likely trying to escape the muddy water downstream, it began to feel a little too much like I was trying to carve out a spot at the Social Hole in Montauk. The fishing wasn't actually that bad, but it was in no way worth dealing with the crowd, so I jetted out of there pretty quickly.

There weren't a ton of other great stream options nearby, so I headed over to a big, pretty conservation area nearby that is known to have some pretty decent pond fishing. I proceeded to finish out the trip in very enjoyable, if somewhat boring fashion, reeling in fat bluegill and 10 inch bass until I got tired of it on a pretty, pine and oak encircled lake with no other fisherman on it. I can think of worse ways to kill an afternoon.