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This blog update has been a long time coming. I couldn’t believe that it was November 2012 since the last site updated. The lack of updates hasn’t been from a lack of fishing last year, just a lack of time. Lots of things have been going on in the land of OzarkChronicles from the fall of 2012 to today. Another Missouri Trout Odyssey was had towards the end of 2012, along with plenty of other fishing trips, the start of a Trout Unlimited Chapter in St. Louis (if you are not a member, you need to become one….check out www.gatewaytu.org) of which I am president, and alot of time with family and friends….and even my first saltwater adventure. So 2012 and most of 2013 have been a busy year. It saw me being published 5 times, including two feature articles and plenty of other photos popping up all over the interwebs, along with a crazy time at my day job. But nonetheless this shit needed to get done. So over the next few weeks, look for me catching up on blog posts. I will leave them up as new posts for awhile, but then will eventually bump them back to the posts on the original date of the trip…..that way the site acts like a trip log for me (half the fun is looking back at my reports from 2001….yeah, they are on here if you look…..that is how long the OzarkChronicles has been on the interwebs). At any rate, I hope you enjoy the updates and I look forward to fishing with many of you over the next year. — Tucker
Monthly Archives: February 2013
Meramec River…First Descent….
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The Meramec River is a river that haunts many of the fly fisherman that live in and around St. Louis. It is one of the closest trout fisheries to St. Louis, the fishing isn’t always great, and you can’t just roll up to the stream hop out of your car and start fishing. With declining fish count numbers and stream accesses with names like “Suicide” and “Cardiac Hill”, the Meramec River is for the committed. Over the years I have heard the old timers at Hargroves Fly Shop talk of the white fly hatch and seen pictures from some of the guys at Feather-Craft of the glory days, and if you take a close look at some of the canoe outfitters that run floats on the trout waters, there are hidden photos of extremely large brown trout taken from the river back in the 90’s and early 2000’s. With so much alure, and not much fishing pressure, I have been bound and determined to drift it in my drift boat…..if the flows hit the right level and I found the right group of guys to help get through anything we encounter.
After watching the water levels, Dan Ritter, Bob Weber, and I hatched a plan to float the river on February 7, 2013. It was a solid plan, we packed the come-a-long hand winch, 300ft of rope, a chainsaw, bow saw, and a few other odds and ends we might need along the way, in addition to all our fishing gear. With that, we launched the boat at the Hwy 8 bridge and set off on the float. What an absolutely scenic river. With the river flowing at 475cfs at Steelville, we had plenty of water to float and didn’t have to push the boat through any shoals. That isn’t to say we didn’t run in to any problems. Our first major issue was just before Dry Fork Creek, where two large trees were completely across the water. Thankfully with the chainsaw, some tools, and some rope, we were able to drop the trees about 3ft and push and pull the boat over the hazard. A little further down stream, we ran into a section of river that we lined the boat through — it looked alot gnarlier than it was, and on second through I could have tried to row it, but pussed out as we drifted up on it. The fishing was tough, as the river has become. Dan Ritter landed one rainbow in the section above the park, and then landed a brown near the cardiac hill walk-in access. We threw big nasty streamers, and did get a few more follows and did see a few trout in the river as we floated. Later, I inquired with the MDC Biologist for the river and learned that the brown trout population for the river is less than 11 fish per mile, so we were definitely pleased with the results of fishing for the day. It was a great day, and if the river levels are right, we will be back on it again. It is definitely a river that haunts me and needs our help. I would encourage everyone to contact the MDC and tell them you are interested in helping the Meramec River trout fishery. Here are the photos from our first trip down it.
White River Hangovers….
There is no better way to nurse a hangover than to head out to the river. After a late night of partying at the boat ramp, none of us could exactly drag our butts out of bed very early, but rise we did. We decided to nurse our heads with a float from Wildcat Shoals to Rim Shoals on the White River. We pounded the bank, putting in time with streamers only to get a few eats today, but so it goes with the winter streamer game. Not much to write about for this day, we finished off the water a little earlier than we had planned, so we sat at the boat ramp waiting on our shuttle and proceeded to empty the cooler of our boat and Dan Forget’s boat as we waited. We ended up meeting a nice group of guys from Michigan that were pulling out their drift boats as well….and I am pretty sure we drank their beer as we traded stories about the day. All in all, another good day on the river.
White River Shindig 2013; A New Tradition?
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What started out as a dare, as most good things do, ended up in myself and Jimmy “T” Traylor cooking biscuits & gravy, blueberry pancakes, hash browns, 10lbs of bacon, and scrambled eggs at a boat ramp on the White River in single digit temps for about 25 of our closest fly fishing bretheren. For anyone that has fished the White River, February 1 is a special date, where they open the C&R area to fishing again, after being closed for 3 months for the spawn. Big fish are always caught in this section in the first week, and it isn’t uncommon for a 10lb trout or two to be caught from this section during the first week. We fed the guys from Chasing the Dream out of Oklahoma, the guys from Fly Fishing Illinois, and several other friends that showed up just to see if we were stupid enough to cook breakfast……..we were, and it was damn good.
The fishing wasn’t bad either. That morning, I broke 20″ with one of my largest rainbows to date from the White River, and several other boats boated fish in excess of 20″. The only issue with the fishing this morning, was we ran out of beer by the time we got to 3 Chutes and needed more, if we were going to float to White Hold. But never fear, JimmyT to the rescue…….thanks to Jimmy, I now tend to favor Sweet Tea & Sailor Jerry (affectionately named “Jimmy Tea”) as my drink of choice on trips. Jimmy shuttled us around to get the trailer and yank the boat out early so we could gear up for the night’s festivities.
All in all, the booze flowed and the social weekend that is opening day on the White River was kicked off properly. But not to be outdone with breakfast, we also had plans to throw a small little shindig at Wild Cat Shoals Boat Ramp that evening. With the help of Jeff House (High Plains Fly Fisher) and Craig Peterson, we grilled up about 60 bacon wrapped brats and served up some other goodness to about 50 people that showed up. It was sort of the who’s who of White River winter fishing with the likes of Steve Dally, Chad Johnson, Alex Lafkas, Jamie Rouse, Ron Yarbourough, Jim Traylor, Davy Wotton, Dominic Zamotto, Larry Babbin, Steve Stinnett, the guys from Chasing the Dream, and two many other people to really remember. It was definitely a great evening with plenty of alcohol drank for everyone, with the party going way in to the night, until only a few were standing. Here are the photos.
