Bear Creek, This one has it all!

[jdmidwest]

Fished the Home Waters today, first time in quite a long while. I fished the Bear Creek in Wayne County, my truest Home Waters as the creek and its feeders run through all of the lands my family owns. I have fished them for 40 some years now. This section was my Grandfather on Mom's side. Lower down on the creek than where it cuts thru our farm. I had not been there since he passed in 2000. I first choose a section that I had always liked near the old iron bridge. Mom told me that they had posted the area and maybe I needed to see the owner to make sure it was alright. After a 30 minute talk with him, I left with no access. I went to school and run around with him and his sister, my dad hauled him to work one summer when they worked the same job, he owed my Grandpa a debt at the country store he used to run that was never collected. I asked nicely to cross his fence, talked about family, and did not press the issue. The answer was no, and I left to a different spot.

I accessed the creek at the spot where I spent alot of the night Grandpa passed away, things had changed alot in the last 7 years, the lane had grown up and a gate had been put up to keep the shitbums out. A popular swimming hole had become meth alley like the other place I started. The creek has shrunk over the years, I barely got nut deep in the crossings. I remember when Grandpa used to carry me on his shoulders through the deeper parts. Of course, my legs are longer now.

The fishing was poor, did not see many in the stream. The fine smallmouth stream has changed alot since the days of my youth. I remember one fine brown bass I watched one summer that lie under a leaning tree. I would lay on that tree and watch his bright red eyes and tried several lures to hook him to no avail.

I did see a nice sized copperhead or cottonmouth swimming the river, at first I thought it was a regular water snake. Then I noticed the body floating high in the water, the tongue sensing the air, and a stripe thru his eye. The clencher was the cats eye pupil. It was either the darkest copperhead or the lightest colored cottonmouth I have seen. The stripe thru the eye leads me to think it may have been a cottonmouth that had just shed out.

[Danoinark]

A great read JD, and painted with love and compassion. I felt I was there. It reminds me of places that I have been and want to return to. Its quite the shame that people can't be good neighbors. I hope someday your stream regenerates to what it once was.

Dano

[Crippled Caddis]

I echo Dano's sentiments JD. Don't worry too much about the ungrateful wretch who wouldn't grant access. Everyone gets what they deserve eventually. That's what worries me.;o)

[Al Agnew]

Yeah...yesterday I too waded and fished a creek that I had spent a lot of time on as a teenager--I fished it a couple of times a month from the time I got a car for the next five years until I moved away. I hadn't been this particular stretch of it since those days (and that was 30 years ago); although I had put in my solo canoe at the access I started from several times in the last few years and floated downstream, I hadn't been upstream from the access.

I was afraid of what I would find. This stretch of creek had been nice habitat and held good fish back in those days, but the stretch below had been (illegally without a permit) dredged for gravel about 15 years ago, and was still pretty much of a mess. The only reason I had floated it was because nobody else ever did and there actually are some nice largemouths and the occasional smallmouth in the shallow, weedy pools. I didn't think the gravel dredging had gone on above the bridge, but I didn't know what to expect...gravel dredging can really affect upstream stretches as well as downstream ones.

The creek was nothing like I remembered it. Murky water where it had once been clear. Choked with aquatic vegetation where it had once been pretty clean gravel. It had eaten away at several banks that the landowner had stupidly cleared right down to the water, and moved its channel long distances. The riffles were totally choked with water willow weeds, to where often you couldn't even see the water. It was brushy and log-jammed, and man, was it tough wading. I caught a couple of really nice largemouths, but the smallies weren't nearly as common as they had been, and there just wasn't a lot of good smallie habitat.

Gravel dredging. Overfertilization from bad farming practices. Tearing up the riparian corridor. Simply a textbook on how to mess up a nice creek.

[jdmidwest]

Well, it seems like you can never go back. Most streams in SE MO are falling into the same repair. The water table is dropping, the streams are filling up with gravel, and accesses are being blocked.

Our grandkids are going to have a whole different world to hunt and fish than we did. Growing up, I had free run of alot of timber plots that were managed by timber companies. They have since been clearcut and made into private hunting clubs. Any stream near a county road was open to the public. I could only think of a few persons that would post their land or block access to the streams. Now, I can only find a few places to get in. The people are the same for the most parts, the attitudes have changed. The county had threatened that guy yesterday to either block the access or they were going to charge him to come out and bust up the fights and drugs, so the story goes. I found this out after the fact yesterday. I guess they were blaming him for generating the problem in the first place. I have seen this happen in other neighboring counties of Perry, Ste. Gen., Butler, and Madison. Swimming hole access near a county road or bridge posted with no trespassing or parking by order of the court of that county.

[Al Agnew]

And you know what? That REALLY ticks me off. Just what exactly is the county sheriff's department good for if they can't be bothered to just make an appearance at such places once every weekend for a while? It wouldn't take much to run the idiots off. And if you want to catch a few drug-heads and other lawbreakers, what better place to do it? After all, most of these accesses are public right of ways, and the public danged sure ought to have the right to use them as long as they aren't breaking the law.

Which brings me to a little observation concerning another thread...where would we be at this point if it wasn't for all the MDC accesses bought with the sales tax?

[jdmidwest]

Al, you know how the smaller counties in Mo work. Short handed and crippled by the good buddy network. Their monies are spent on the weekends patrolling the 2 main lakes in the county. You have an access close to you at the gravel pit that has a similar problem. I kiss the ground when I return to the truck parked there and see all the windows in it.

[Thom]

Al:

You are so right. Those inept politicains and mismanaging dept heads at the MDC may have some foresight after all.

I spent a day in Wisconson a few years back following back roads with a state map that detailed wild trout streams. Most were barely accessable and in very bad shape. Since I had maps with mileage markers I was able to find exact road entrances to open streams. On a few occasions I found small signs that had obviously been taken down by locals and thrown in the weeds. One place a guy told me that I was on private property. I showed him the map and He said "yea you are right" and then explained that most outsiders were usually scared off but I looked like I was alright. It was state owned property but badly maintained.

A simular experience in Colorado North west of Pagosa springs on govt land.

[brownieman]

The MDC has established numerous accesses statewide...well kept in high profile areas and piss poor maintenance in rural areas. Our water levels in streams are falling and due to bad practices... what used to be waist deep water in now ankle deep...numerous reasons as you mentioned.

There are MDC lakes with cement ramps so steep its's a hard launch...so covered with gravel your rig slings chat all over your boat trying to pull out...trash cans over flowing with trash, poor road maintenance within their areas, the restrooms have literally been burnt by locals, banks lined with trash and the list goes on. These problems exist mainly in the rural areas.

They provide it...do not they have the money and manpower to take care of it?...just my opinion but these are things I have seen.

I won't even get into some of the river accesses I have seen and had to TRY to use...disturbing to me...it appears on such accesses(some lakes and rivers) any mowing that takes place...well...if it cannot be reached with a riding mower, under fences, around posts and signs, etc...the grass is brown and dead...you know as well as I do what causes that...IMO no state employee is to fond of running a weed eater.

I hate it for our grandchildren...at least during my time I sure HAD allot of fishable water and still have a little...but we are losing it at an alarming rate.