54 replies to this topic

[Michael Wolfe]

I'm famous in MO!

[mattknepley]

Great work, Casper!

Looks like Michael is gonna have to be the featured model in the upcoming "Studs of NANFA" calendar...

[Chasmodes]

Sweet!!!!!

[Isaac Szabo]

Cool. Nicely done, Casper.

[Casper]

Day 5 Gravel Bar Boil

 

That morning we rendezvoused at the Visitor Center and took a quick tour as folks gathered.  Lots of history, displays and quite a few photos of my hero's work, Dr. Roston, the grandfather of freshwater photography.

The day before Michael and i had come up with a plan to hike a spring run all the way to the river, checking out different pools of clear spring water for unique species.  But later that evening several people expressed the desire to tag along on the adventure.  That site did not offer conditions for a mass movement of humanity so to be fair we lead the snorkel group back to Indian Creek, the beautiful site from the day before.  Convenient, plenty of thrashing feets and elbow room, clear water, spawning fish and good parking for all, eventually becoming a 5 or 7 vehicle caravan.  Upon arrival, and again driving through the purple hued tree bracketed entry way Cyan, Michael and i parked and hotfooted upstream to the Bleeding Shiner site and spent the first early morning hour enjoying it.  As the others slowly meandered about eventually working their ways upstream i advanced even further scouting for more sites and was pleased to observe several active Rock Bass nests near a log jam.  I was almost to the bridge when i saw Josh beelining towards me and upon arrival told me the local Sheriff had evicted our clan of river snorkelers.  I didn't fret none too much and slow walked back snorkeling here and there as the time was almost our designated departure time anyway.  The color purple is not a nice color in MO land and the 2 bracketing trees were marked with long faded paint.  I thought about returning with a fresh coat of blue paint and marking the trees "FREE RIVER PARKING".

 

 

Harvest at the weir.

 

 

 

Dr. Roston's nearly famous photo.

 

 

 

Cyan amongst the Shiners and Minnows.

 

 

 

The Bleeders were going strong in the cooler morning hours, Ozark minnows by their sides.  As the morning warmed the activity seemed to diminish.

 

 

 

This was a great nest i wish the Sheriff had not pulled me from. Rock Bass i think as opposed to Ozarks. Shadows to my south at home.

 

 

 

After leaving Indian Creek we had enough time to check out the spring run again.  Being already wet it was an easy dip and dunk for a few minutes.  Much colder than the Indian though.

 

 

 

64 brrrr.

 

 

 

Orangethroat in the chill.

 

 

 

Southern Redbellies too, and Creek Chubs.  Crayfish.  It would have been a fun adventure to do that snorkel walkabout.

 

 

 

Our vantage point looking up to the culverts.

 

 

Close by were these furnace ruins.

 

 

 

The Gravel Bar Boil was awesome.  I have included several pictures of attending folks on the forum under "Fishheads of Missouri" located here...

 

http://forum.nanfa.o...-missouri-2017/

 

 

 

 

Getting there via Jet Boat, a high speed, up river run.  Hold on!

 

 

 

Cyan and Michael made the float down from upriver.  I rested my behind and waited in the cool shade.  I heard they made a great team.  Thank you Michael.

 

 

 

Iowa Scott caught him a high falutin' Yankee Studfish.

 

 

 

Michigan Bob came with a Meramec.

 

 

 

Gravel bar sprawlers dining on corn, taters, shrimps, sausages, pies, cakes and cookies..

 

 

 

After the feeding i urged Bob to assemble the group for one massive photo as the sun lowered and just before the canoes and boats departed.

 

What a wonderful day it was!

 

 

 

 

 

[Chasmodes]

Great report and photos again Casper!  Thanks for sharing.

[Isaac Szabo]

Nice photos. That was a fun day.

[mattknepley]

Nice group shot! I admire the patience of those who wrangled us all together for it. I won't say it was like herding cats, but not far off!

[Michael Wolfe]

Nice group shot! I admire the patience of those who wrangled us all together for it. I won't say it was like herding cats, but not far off!

Herding redhorse?
Herding buffalos?
Herding stonerollers?

[mattknepley]

All I know is it was a good thing we were stuffed to capacity with some quality eats or we would've scattered...

[Casper]

I discovered a product embracing 2 of Chattanooga's cultural culinary icons recently.

 

Being appreciative of their 2 case baked fresh pie donations to NANFA over the years i delivered a carton, waffle cones and a scoop to the Moon Pie Lady at the Chattanooga Bakery this Halloween morning.

 

Surprisingly most of them had not tried it.

 

[Casper]

Day 6 Talks

 

Bob had found a nice meeting room for us complete with a kitchen, room to stretch and storage areas.  It was located at the end of a dead end road next to the state park's "hotel" that many attendees stayed at.

I will let others relay the various talks but i enjoyed all of them.  Cyan and i sat in the back of the room hawking NANFA goods while Olaf sat next to us promoting his wonderful NANFA Missouri shirts. ( Some sizes still available at NANFA's store, www.nanfa.org. )

Later on they brought in and spread out an excellent banquet dinner and even later the auction concluded.  My item of regret is not winning the metal sculpted darter fish seen on the table corner, created with fire by Bob's son Chris.

I heard the auction was a big success financially.

We appreciated all the different speakers throughout the day and the dinner cooks and auction folks late into the night.

I was worn out after 3 or 4 days of snorkeling and to bed early i went.

 

 

 

 

 

[Casper]

Day 7 Snorkeling at Blue Springs Creek

 

This is all fading from my memory but some highlights in reviewing my photos were the clear water, fine weather, the Meramec Saddled Darter Brawl, laying in a shallow run full of Fantails, Sculpins, Rainbows and Crays and ending the beautiful day by driving to Cuba for some of Missouri Hick's excellent BBQ.

 

 

 

 

 

The Brawl.  

 

 

Isaac tried to work his magic on this one photo.  My TG4 continues to befuddle me... with great frustration.

I have some video of the fight but it is time consuming to edit on my old XP.  It was a pretty dang good show overall.  Michael had first caught glimpse of the fight in a shallow run and he gave me space to ease in, allowing me to film and observe about 10 minutes of continuous fighting.

 

 

 

Michael floating over a nice pool of Hogsuckers.  We walked quite a ways upstream in the small spring run, finding lots to observe in each pool deep enough to lay in.  It was very pretty back in the meandering, canopied stream.  Several log jams offered scoured plunge pools, ideal for snorkeling views.

 

 

 

A nice, clean shot of a beautiful Meramec Saddled Darter, probably the most impressive species i encountered on the trip.

Hum, maybe i should rethink that...

 

 

 

 

Plenty of Crayfish.  These were well marked.

 

 

 

 

Probably a Rainbow, though perhaps a Orangethroat?  Red on the anal fin = Rainbow.

 

 

We eventually walked back to the main stream and drove upstream, parking near the highway well past the bridge.  Several NANFA members were dipnetting and seining the area up and down from the bridge but i walked alone to a quiet area and found a nice, sunlit, shallow run absolutely full of Sculpins, Rainbows and Crays but mostly exciting were the male Fantails displaying with confidence.

 

 

 

A trio of camoed Sculpins.

 

 

 

Handsome Fantail.

 

 

 

Dead or stunned?  I came across this guy, perhaps beat down by his opponent.  You can really see his egg mimics telling the ladies just how good he can care for her eggs.

 

 

 

Having enough and the day cooling i went back upstream where the others were assembled.  Tyler was demonstrating his Darter catching skills and hand holding the fish urging them to flare their fins in full glory.  He has his swishing technique well established.

 

 

 

 

 

Having had a full day we drove to Cuba to get some of the fine BBQ offered at Missouri Hicks.  It's a neat town so afterwards we drove around a bit exploring.  Cuba embraces the culture and tourism of being right on route 66.

 

Another great day!

 

 

Also noted were Greensides, SRBD, Hogsuckers galore.  Bleeding Shiners.  I can't recall others but certainly there were many more.

 

 

Here is a link to the attending Missouri Fishheads, including some encountered this particular day...

 

http://forum.nanfa.o...-missouri-2017/

 

 

 

[keepnatives]

Great photos and memories.

[lilyea]

Thanks Casper!  This is another great update and a fantastic advertisement for the world of snorkeling!

[mattknepley]

Thanks for posing! The darter brawl video was definitely a fascinating thing to watch. The color commentary provided was pretty humorous, even if there wasn't a play-by-play announcer. The Gilts in the Meramec may have been my favoritest of the fishes in the convention proper,the Brooks on the way home give them run for their money though. So many other fish so worthy of being "favorites". Plenty of other creatures, too. Added a couple more ticks to my birding life list and won't ever forget chasing the world's most pacifist skunk down the campground road with Beaman.

Missouri was a lot of fun; I look forward to GA.

[Casper]

Day 8 Huzzah

 

 

We caravaned early to a marked parking area and walked a narrow trail leading to a high precarious bank.

The river was clear, wide, shallow and clean cobbled.

 

 

 

Quick caught view of a Slider belly.

 

 

 

I hiked upstream exploring the long shallow runs and found a riffle dam that was full of Gilt Darters and loggies.  I see the Gilts back at home too.  Odd how so many Missouri fish hop the Mississippi creating distinct populations.  Several species do that from the Ozarks skipping over to the Tennessee drainage.

 

 

 

Little animated Flapjack.

 

 

 

The river was running too shallow to snorkel many places but this log offered a nice scoured out area.  Lots of fish were using its structure including some Meramecs.  We could not keep our head in long as a lot of time was spent staying alert dodging all the canoe and raft traffic.  I thought that odd being it was a Monday but folks were enjoying the pretty day.

 

 

 

Sculpin in the mask.

 

 

 

Back in his lair.

 

 

 

We enjoyed a nice picnic, warming in the sunshine and gathered our stuff for our walk out.  It was a beautiful day.  I think Isaac missed our lunch break as he had headed way downstream to the juncture of the river.

 

 

 

Waving to the Bleeding Shiner.

 

 

 

Hot colors still.

 

Hiking out i decided not to climb the steep, precarious bank figuring i would cut thru the woods to our vehicles.  Big mistake, no trail and the stinging neetles were waist high blocking access to the parking area.  By the time i got out i was ON FIRE and freaking out as the burn was so intense.  Much more intense than the nettles back home.  I was begging for anything to relieve the burn.  Skin lotion, toothpaste, anything to rub on.  Linda gave me something and it graciously brought relief.  I will never walk through a patch like that again.

 

 

 

We stopped at Blue Springs for another quick look and checked out the local's stone stacking zone.

It had been a full day, the sun was getting low and we were all quite hungry.  We voted for another dinner at Missouri Hicks, which was just as good as the evening before.

 

 

 

 

 

[elting44]

Thank you for sharing!!! The Longear from day 1 is remarkable, I hope there are some like that on my side of the border.

The darter brawl photos are outstanding.

[mattknepley]

I made the same shortcut through nettles mistake, too, Casper. Only they weren't quite so high or thick as yours. Burn like crazy. Fortunately, flowing water dulled the pain fairly quickly and as the nettles stood between me and a stream, it worked out ok. Definitely took a more cautious route out, though! My first and hopefully last experience with that stuff.

I don't recall getting into any at the sites Bob picked out for us; it was mostly when we were doing some independent adventuring...

[Casper]

Hum...the map Hrabik provided to the snorkel team had walking trails clearly marked directly through vast stands of nettles.

 

Rubbing cool water on burning legs does near nothing in my experiences.  Lotion, anything pasty, maybe even a peanut butter milkshake might could possibly offer relief during frantic desperation.  These Missouri nettles were far more severe than anything i've encountered elsewhere.  Next time you see a patch of the scourge, carefully hold a leaf up to the sky and inspect the underside.  Zillions of little hypodermic needles!  Do you know they are edible?  It takes a good bit of rinsing and boiling i suspect.

 

I never get tired of seeing proud Longear Sunfish.  There are several varieties scattered across North America including that Mohawk fella in OK.

 

I was very disappointed with the darter battle.  I keep having issues with all the variable settings.  I may try and do some video editing if time permits.