It is hard to believe that it has been almost 2 months since I have set foot on a Missouri trout stream.. With the holidays and a work project that just won’t quit, it is no wonder as we are all slaves to something. I was supposed to be on the White River in Arkansas this weekend, but an ice storm hit the area on Tuesday and the Mountain Home area was declared a Federal Disaster Area; so we opted to postpone our trip to the following weekend (we leave on Thursday with the Hyde in tow). Down and out that I wasn’t in Arkansas, I called Craig Peterson and suggested a Super Bowl trip to the Little Piney. That was all it took, and it was on.
We rolled out of the Denny’s parking lot at 5am and onto the icy forest service road near the Mill Dam Hollow access on the Little Piney. As we expected, we were the only ones at the access, although others have fished the area since the snow storm earlier this week. We quickly suited up and hit the river. We headed downstream for aways, until we ran out of footprints in the snow and were fishing new water. The fly of choice was Pyscho Prince Nymph under a yarn indicator (about 3ft deep), Craig picked up fish on a Beaded San Juan Worm under a yarn indicator about 4ft deep in the faster water.
We didn’t light the world on fire, but fish were caught. I LDR’d a couple of fish, including a rainbow that was pushing close to 20″. It was by far the biggest fish I have seen / felt on this river. Craig had the fish of the day though, and he should have since he doesn’t get out as much as the rest of us. We reeled up around 11am and headed back to St. Louis for Super Bowl festivities with our families. All in all, not a bad day at all and the scenery with the snow couldn’t be beat.
I SO dig that little stream now. I probably would have traded you the opener for fishing the Little Piney.