smallmouth wade fishing opportunities in the spring

[basska]

On 1/24/2025 at 12:35 PM, ollie said:

Even though the Elk gets hammered in the summer, you at least have a chance at a decent fish out of there. JMO

While I would definitely check out the Elk, I never considered it as seriously as wading water. Are there any good access points for a mile or so of bank hopping and wading? I will probably try to make it down there in May, so we will see about water levels.

[ollie]

Depends on water levels. When it is running less CFS you can wade in a lot of spots. Although it fishes better at higher levels. I actually only fished it a couple of times last year due to low water. I normally put in the yak to fish.

[Johnsfolly]

On 1/24/2025 at 1:44 PM, Flysmallie said:

Those smallmouth in that Indian are actually Neosho's. That's where our Neosho movie filming begins in March. 

I have caught Neosho's from Indian Creek near Lanagan. Posted a photo on the one of the other threads on here. Caught some redspot chub there as well that they fight almost as well as the bass 😉.

[Fishmonger]

On 1/14/2025 at 10:10 AM, Fishmonger said:

I'm trying to plan a fishing trip with a few friends to the ozarks this march and I'm trying to look for an area that will offer us a lot of bank/wade fishing opportunities because we don't have a good way to bring/transport kayaks or anything, probably in Missouri but open to the other areas as well. My struggles have been that I've found a lot of conflicting information online about how much public access different areas have and I'm concerned we're going to struggle to find places we can realistically and legally fish once we're there, I don't know how it is there but where we're from in kansas I know this is often near impossible with the exception of dedicated parks and recreation areas. My other concern is that I know spring can be very rainy there and I don't know if high water levels are going to present us even more challenges when it comes to wading/bank fishing. If anyone has any input on a general area of the ozarks for us to check out or any tips/solutions at all regarding my listed concerns that would be greatly appreciated! None of us have ever done anything like this before so researching has been a bit of a learning curve.

 

This is also my first post on this forum so hopefully I'm doing this right as far as where to post and everything, please let me know if I need to change anything

We've actually decided we are going to head down to Oklahoma for a few days, I have some business in Muskogee I was going to have to go down there for at some point anyways so I thought we might as well save some time and turn it into our fishing trip. Right now we're looking at Barren Fork and other parts of the upper illinois. If anyone has any tips on areas that might be worth looking at within a couple of hours of Muskogee that would be great!