4/19 Red Ribbon Report

[Haris122]

I bought some new waders a few weeks back and finally got to try them out. I was hoping to multitask, giving both the waders a rigorous test, and expanding my knowledge of the red ribbon section at the same time, so my plan was to start up at the Hwy 8 Access, and wade all the way down to the confluence with Meramec Springs, since I never made it quite far down that way. Unfortunately I was slow to get going, and by the time I got to the access, and started wading it was around 1:30pm. Some people had been camping on the gravel bar, but they didn't seem to be fishing at the time so I got into the water and first decided to head upstream slowly, up to the bridge and back the first hour. Didn't get much action, but it was pretty cool seeing the clear water and the various schools of smaller fish, and other wildlife and scenery around. For the first time, I actually saw a snake chilling on the bottom of the river. It bugged out after I came close enough to notice it in the clear water. I really just threw rapalas and other jerk and/or crankbaits that day, and in that first stretch I didn't get much action, not even in the deeper backwater by the bridge. I was expecting to get some bites from sunfish and such, and hoping for the odd big trout or bass as well, but my catches in that section amounted to only one decent Rock Bass, and a little longear sunfish. Something bigger might have been chasing stuff around, cause I did see schools of fish jumping out of the water, and heard some splashing. Anyways, after that I slowly made my way downstream, with no luck in the riffle, the run, and then the prolonged slowly deepening riffle with lots of slippery chunk rocks within the first mile. Along the way I saw a good sized snake sunning itself on a rock in the middle of the stream, that I steered away from. Finally I got to a deeper pool that went on for quite a while, and that's where I pretty much caught most of the remaining fish. It was a good mix of smallmouth, various sunfish, rock bass, what I think was a shiner, and some fish with weird bumps on it's head. All of the fish however, were on the short side. About the only ones that were a little better sized (relatively for their species), were the rock bass, and possibly the shiner and weird fish (since I don't know how big they're supposed to get). As the pool ended, I tried my luck in the riffle following it to no avail, then a slow, real shallow "pool", and pretty much made it down to around the campgrounds/picnic tables at Meramec Springs, before I decided that I needed to head back fast, before it got dark. On the way back upstream I didn't fish much, since I had about an hour to cover the 3 miles back upstream, but I did stop again in the deep pool and caught a few more smaller fish there. Still, no trout though. The only trout I did see however, was what looked like a nice 18-20" rainbow that I got to witness jumping out of the water. I'm assuming it had been there a while cause it wasn't real silvery in the mid section, but instead had more of a reddish tint. I also saw a couple of turtles, a flock of turkey vultures, and witnessed a deer crossing the river, which was pretty cool. I still need to make my way up a little bit from meramec springs to where I stopped this time, and then I will actually have scouted out the entire red ribbon section from hwy 8, down to a little below suicide access.   

By the way, I also saw someone had cleaned what looked like some white bass or hybrid white/striped bass near the gravel bank at the Hwy 8 access, which made me wonder if those are found that far upstream on the Meramec or if someone just decided to stop by and clean his catch from somewhere else?