Trout Fishing Report for Bennett Spring
Brought to you by
Weaver's Tackle Store
June 21, 2017

Courtesy of Jason Krone

How's Fishing?

Although water conditions are not optimal, fishing continues to be really good. There have been large numbers of fish caught and released as well as nice stringers. The water is murky but not running fast or deep. Typically the fish that we have seen on stringers weighing in at a pound to a pound and a half.

What's Working?

From the fly case:

crane flys
olive RGN's -16
renegade
bennett blue crackleback, green crackleback
zebra midge



Zone 1 & 2

white floss
white jig
Tinsel Jigs
white floss with red head
Possum hair roach
Marabou - , red & black, white, gingersnap, olive & brown, ginger, orange & white, yellow & white, and, of course, black & yellow
white sparkle grub
Rooster tails - brown sparkle, bumble bee, black



Zone 3

trout nuggets
power bait: white, yellow, salmon peach, florescent orange
Orange Worms

Water Conditions

Bennett Spring
Gage house level is 2.25
Daily Discharge levels:
All discharge numbers are in Cubic Feet per Second
minimum was 77 in 1982
25th percentile is 127
Median is 160
Mean is 220
75th percentile is 232
current level is 202
Max was 1240 in 1981


June 12, 2017

Niangua River conditions
Gage House reading (water level) is 1.66 feet.
Discharge levels in cubic feet per second:
Minimum was 70.1 in 2014
25th percentile is 118
Today's reading is 143
Median is 284
Mean is 609
75th percentile is 463
record high max was 5350 in 2015

Courtesy of Jason Krone

Fishing Times  

Lunker Club

6-14-17

Brad Long from Warrensburg, MO
2 pounds on orange power bait in zone 3

Norman Valle from DeSoto MO
2 pounds on an orange worm in zone 3


6-15-17

Tom Kinney from Shelbina, MO
2 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 1

Ben Steinkamp from Hillsboro, MO
2 pounds on a white floss in zone 2


6-16-17

Darrin Woodall from Concordia, MO
2 pounds on a white fly in zone 1

Joshua Balsley from Licking, MO
2-1/2 pounds on a glitter jig in zone 1


6-17-17

Lin Miles from Rolla, MO
3 pounds on a tinsel jig in zone 1

Cody Myrtle from Butler, MO
2-1/8 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 1

Jack Kaeshoefer from O'Fallon MO
2 pounds on a ginger marabou in zone 2

Miles Drummond from columbia, MO
2 pounds on a orange & white marabou in zone 2

Grant Hollister from Blue Springs, MO
3 pounds on a zebra midge in zone 1

Dalton Kaeshoefer from St. Louis, MO
2-1/4 pounds on a ginger marabou in zone 2


6-18-17

Cody Myrtle from Butler, MO
2.8 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 1

Cindy Kinney from Shelbina, MO
2.25 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 1

Ian Daly from St. Charles, MO
2 pounds on a yellow & white marabou in zone 2

Ian Daly from St. Charles, MO
2.4 pounds on a red & white marabou in zone 2

Jim Gallaher from Wildwood, MO
2-1/4 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 1

Nick Dierking from Marthasville, MO
2 pounds on a white marabou in zone 1

David Hendricks from Jay, OK
3 pounds on a black rooster tail in zone 2

Will Falkoner from Lake Ozark, MO
4 pounds on a white floss jig in zone 2

Anthony Vaccaro from Winfield, MO
2-1/4 pounds on a gingersnap marabou in zone 1


6-19-17

Bryce Krone from Bonner Springs, KS
2 pounds on a black & gold marabou in zone 1

Jason Krone from Bonner Springs, KS
2 pounds on a black & gold marabou in zone 1

Ron Walker from Mesquite, TX
2-1/2 pounds on a white nymph in zone 1

Jonathon Bain from Houston, TX
2-1/2 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 1


6-20-17

Dan Krone from Apollo Beach, FL
2 pounds on a black & gold marabou in zone 1

Calendar of Events

Friday, June 23rd
8 pm Owl Prowl – Meet at the Nature Center Classroom. After watching a video we will hike in their night time habitat. Wear appropriate clothing, footwear and bring a flashlight.

Saturday, June 24th
10 am - noon Missouri Fish – Today is National Catfish Day
Arts & Crafts in the Nature Center Classroom

2 pm Aquatic Walk – Meet at Natural Tunnel Trail Head above the head of the Bennett Spring. Discover creatures living while getting your feet wet!.

Sunday, June 25th

2 pm Bennett Spring Bats – A presentation on current research will be presented. Specimens for viewing but none are alive. Learn more about bat habitat and White Nose Syndrome.

Weed Cutting June 28 & 29 @ 8:00 AM

Friday - June 30
8 pm Beavers – Nature’s Best Engineers.
Meet at the Nature Center Classroom.

Saturday – July 1st
10 am Hatchery Tour – A guided tour will be given of the fish hatchery.
Meet at the newest hatchery building.
12-4pm Frogs and Toads – What’s the difference? Stop by the Nature Center Classroom to find out.
6 pm Nature Bingo! Bring a lawn chair or blanket to sit on near the
playground area across from the park store.
8 pm Spider Sniff – Meet at the Nature Center. Wear appropriate clothing and Footwear. Bring a flashlight.

Sunday - July 2nd
2 pm Spring Ladies – An entertaining historic preservation program in the Nature Center Classroom. Journey back in time to hear the stories of three women who found life, hope and home near Bennett Spring. Three centuries will be presented in historic accurate clothing and Mike Pace will play the Mountain Dulcimer between stories.

Monday - July 3rd
2 pm Explosive Art at the Nature Center

Weed Cutting August 9th & 10th @ 8:00 AM

Weed Cutting September 20th & 21st @ 8:00 AM

Saturday, September 30, 2017
New: Ladies Only Free Fishing Day. No tag needed, just fishing license if required.
Time: 7:30 AM to 7:15 PM

Weather Forecast

Thursday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 87. South wind 5 to 8 mph.


Friday: A 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Mostly cloudy, with a high near 82.


Saturday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 80.


Sunday: Partly sunny, with a high near 76.


Monday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 77.


Tuesday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 80.

Quote of the Week

I've always been of two minds about fly-fishing. On the one hand, here's a guy standing in cold water up to his liver throwing the world's most expensive clothesline at trees. A full two-thirds of his time is spent untangling stuff, which he could be doing in the comfort of his own home with old shoelaces, if he wanted. The whole business costs like sin and requires heavier clothing. Furthermore, it's conducted in the middle of black fly season. Cast and swat. Cast and swat. fly-fishing may be a sport invented by insects with fly fishermen as bait. And what does the truly sophisticated dry-fly fisherman do when he finally bags a fish? He lets the fool thing go and eats baloney sandwiches instead. On the other hand, I wouldn't be completely happy doing any other kind of fishing.

Author: P.J. O'Rourk, fly-fishing Primer

Published: Seasons of the Angler

Thanks for reading! Lucy

OUR PREVIOUS REPORT:

Trout Fishing Report for Bennett Spring
Brought to you by
Weaver's Tackle Store
June 13, 2017

How's Fishing

The fishing this weekend was amazing.  There were good stringers as well as large numbers for catch and release. Monday the fishing has been a little tougher for some reason. It may be the full moon, change in weather, or smarter fish!

A couple of successful lures are the gingersnap marabou and olive crackleback or RGN. Renegades have started working, also.

Good sized fish can be found in every zone.

Of Interest

The following is an e-mail sent out by Ben Havens, hatchery manager.

BENNETT SPRING HATCHERY HIGHLIGHTS FOR MAY 2017

Tag Sales
For the month of May we sold 14,592 tags. Tag sales were down due to the highly unpredictable weather and very poor water clarity we had throughout the month. We received over 10 inches of rain for the month. We are down 16% over last May and 12.5% from last year this time. However, we are only about 5% below the 5-year avg. (44,509 tags) for Year to Date tag sales. Hopefully, things will settle down soon! We had our busiest day of the year so far with 1,455 tags sold on the Sunday of Memorial day weekend.


Fish Production
Poor water quality has remained a problem. May was a very wet month and this kept the spring branch off color for most of the time. Due to the poor water quality, we had and continue to have issues with small chronic disease outbreaks. Staff remain on top of the situation and trying to stay a step ahead of it. Outside production continues to do well, most of our lots for 2017 stocking are of good size and ate staged for stocking. We have surplus fish if needed somewhere in the Coldwater hatchery system and space available to take fish for holdover if needed. The feed room is full.


Fish Stockings
We completed the following stockings this month.
Trout Park - 26,720 fish
Niangua River TMA – 900 fish
Total Stocked - 27,620 fish



Spring Flow
We started the month at 1,190 cfs (769 mgd) during the height of a flood and in flood stage. We ended the month at 283 cfs (183 mgd) and remain above normal flow. We gained over 10” of rain throughout the month however it came slowly and spread out. The spring branch has been above normal all month long.











Fish Hauls
We had no fish hauls in or out of the hatchery for the month of May.


Bennett Spring Access Maintenance
Staff cleaned and prepared area for increased use now that floating season is upon here. The privies were pumped and trash removed. The parking lot sustained quite a bit of damage during the flood rises. D&D staff has made repairs and it is looking much better.


Hatchery Maintenance
Staff has used their time cleaning on the area, mowing our site and repairing stocking points. We have painted curbs, railings, and other infrastructure. Repairs were made to the wader wash station due to damage during flooding. We added rock to several access roads on the hatchery grounds that were washed out with the heavy rains we received over the month.


Outreach
We had twelve scheduled hatchery tours this month for over 904 people. We held a stream team cleanup on May 13th. It was attended by over 25 people. We picked up a fair amount of trash and everyone had a good time. Our next big event will be Kid’s Free fishing day on June 10th.

What's Working?

From the fly case:

chartreuse or gray mop fly
olive RGN's -16
renegade
bead head crackleback, golden olive crackleback



Zone 1 & 2

glo balls - white with pink dot, white
white floss with red head
peach floss
Possum hair roach
Marabou - , peach, gingersnap, salmon & brown, white, and, of course, black & yellow
bedspread - fished deep
Rooster tails - brown sparkle, bumble bee, brown



Zone 3

power bait: sherbet, yellow, salmon peach,
salmon eggs
Orange Worms

Water Conditions

June 12, 2017

Bennett Spring
Gage house level is 2.32
Daily Discharge levels:
All discharge numbers are in Cubic Feet per Second
minimum was 81 in 1977
25th percentile is 129
Median is 189
Mean is 207
75th percentile is 253
current level is 222
Max was 499 in 1995




June 12, 2017

Niangua River conditions
Gage House reading (water level) is 1.67 feet.
Discharge levels in cubic feet per second:
Minimum was 52 in 2016
25th percentile is 128
Today's reading is 145
Median is 307
Mean is 572
75th percentile is 666
record high max was 2210 in 1993

Lunker Club

5-31-17

Steve Hampton from Linn Creek, MO
2-1/2 pounds on a gingersnap marabou in zone 1

Keith Schuster from Camdenton, MO
2-1/4 pounds on red & white floss jig in zone 1

Keith Schuster from Camdenton, MO
2 pounds on a red & white floss jig in zone 1

Joe Herman from Osage Beach, MO
2-1/4 pounds on a salmon & white marabou in zone 1


6-1-17

Michael Dowling from Kearney, MO
2 pounds on a ginger marabou in zone 1

Tony Maucelli from Platte City, MO
2-1/4 pounds on a red marabou in zone 1

William Cole from Warrensburg, MO
2 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 1


6-2-17

Kim Smedley from Salisbury, MO
2 pounds on a white grub in zone 2

Jim Nauert from Quincy, ILL
2 pounds on a guienea jig in zone 2

Jason Grosse from Herman, MO
2-1/4 pounds on a peach marabou in zone 2

Brayden Faulkner from Whitehall, IL - 2 fish, same size and lures
2-1/2 pounds on pink & white marabou in zone 2

Brady Houska from St. Louis, MO
2 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 2


6-3-17

Keaton Smith from Higbee, MO
2-1/8 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 1

Reanne Fitterling from Blue Springs, MO
2 pounds on a spinner in zone 2

Jared Plybon from Fulton, MO
2 pounds on an original tri color glo ball


6-4-17

Johnathan Block from Frankenstein, MO
2-1/2 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 2

Donald Asher from Brookfield, MO
3 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 2

Joe Searcy from Sunrise Beach, MO
2 pounds on a brown wooly in zone 2

Felix Owens from Chesterfield, MO
2-1/2 pounds on a white & peach marabou in zone 2

Grant Schmitz from Jefferson City, MO
4 pounds on a home made bait in zone 3

Mike Mildfelt from Winfield, KS
2-1/2 pounds on salmon & brown marabou in zone 2

Nolan Beal from Lebanon, MO
2 pounds on a home tied fly in zone 1


6-6-17

Morgan Houston from Farmington, MO
2 pounds on a salmon marabou in zone 2

Jackson Forck from Columbia, MO
2 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 2

Don Harris from Lee's Summit
2 pounds, 3 ounces on a white jig in zone 1

Tracy McCann from Centralia, MO
4-1/2 pound brown on home made dough bait in zone 3


6-7-17

Collin Voyles from Festus, MO
3-1/4 pounds on a orange worm in zone 3

Dillon Voyles from Festus, MO
2 pounds on an orange worm in zone 3


6-9-17

Connor Bailey from Jeff City, MO
2 pounds on an orange & brown rooster tail in zone 1

Tim Berchardt from Kearney, MO
2 pounds on a white marabou in zone 1


6-10-17

Deb Ellis from Shawnee, OK
2 pounds on a black & yellow rooster tail in zone 1

Felix Owens from Chesterfield, MO
2-1/8 pounds on a olive marabou in zone 1

Felix Owens from Chesterfield, MO
2-1/8 pounds on a olive marabou in zone 1(second fish)

Jared Lootens from Jeff City, MO
2 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 2

Larry Gibson from Kirksville, MO
2-1/4 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 2

Easton Holloway (age 4) from Jeff City, MO
2 pounds on a minnow in zone 3

Derek P. Hubler from Pinckneyhville, IL
2-1/2 pounds on a bead head ginger wooley in zone 1

Grant Ruediger from Harmon, MO
2-1/2 pounds on a green/pink spinner in zone 2

Alexandria Tan from Overland Park, KS (age 9)
2 pounds on pink power bait in zone 3

Kingston Tan from Overland Park, KS ( age 7)
2 pounds on brown power bait in zone 3


6-11-17

Scott Veeck from Wadesville IN
2-1/4 pounds on red & white marabou in zone 2

Nat Stoebe from Higbee, MO
2 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 2

Jared Lootens from Jeff City, MO
3-1/4 pounds on home made dough bait in zone 3

Anthony McElroy from Troy, MO
2-1/8 pounds on a roe glo ball in zone 1

Sharon Owens from Chesterfield, MO
2-1/8 pounds on a white marabou jig in zone 2

Frankie Hungerford from Jacksonville, IL
2 pounds on a gingersnap in zone 2

Tom Kinney from Shelbina, MO
2-1/4 pounds


6-12-17

Chase Bresler from St. Louis, MO
2 pounds on a chamois in zone 1

Don Ohler from Urich, MO
2-1/4 pounds on an olive marabou in zone 2

Wanda Ohler from Urich, MO
2 pounds on a yellow and black rooster tail in zone 1

Frank Matthew Bellew from KC, MO
2-1/2 pounds on a white glo ball in zone 2


6-13-17

Felix Owens from Chesterfield, MO
2-1/4 pounds on a white marabou in zone 1

Sharon Owens from Chesterfield, MO
2-1/2 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 1

Allington Jolly from Columbia, MO
2 pounds on a black & yellow marabou in zone 1

Jim Lucas from Wright city, MO
3 pounds on homemade bait in zone 3

Ashley Sommer from Wright City, MO
3 pounds 10 ounces on homemade bait in zone 3

Fishing Times 

Calendar of Events

Friday, June 16 - Furbearer & Tracks, 1 to 4 pm in the Nature Center Classroom
Spider Sniff- Nature Center Classroom Video and Hike, Wear appropriate clothing and footwear and bring a flashlight.

Saturday, June 17 - Hike around the spring trail - 9 am

Saturday, June 17 - Fish Hatchery Tour at 10 am
Fish Art - Nature center Classroom

Sunday, June 18 - Prehistoric Missouri, 2 pm in the Nature Center Classroom


Weed Cutting June 28 & 29 @ 8:00 AM
Weed Cutting August 9th & 10th @ 8:00 AM
Weed Cutting September 20th & 21st @ 8:00 AM


Saturday, September 30, 2017
New: Ladies Only Free Fishing Day. No tag needed, just fishing license if required.
Time: 7:30 AM to 7:15 PM

Weather Forecast

Thursday: A 30 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms before 1pm. Mostly sunny, with a high near 89. Southwest wind around 6 mph.


Friday: A 30 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms after 1pm. Mostly sunny, with a high near 89.


Saturday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 89.


Sunday: A chance of showers and thunderstorms. Partly sunny, with a high near 84.


Monday: Sunny, with a high near 84.

Quote of the Week

'Limititis" is the affliction, endemic within our sport, which causes anglers to misread 'limit' as 'target'. It is probably the sport's greatest cause of stress, frustration and unhappiness, and it matters not how often anglers are told that the limit is simply the maximum number of fish they are allowed to catch during a session, there will always be those who see it as target and feel inept or cheated whenever they fail to achieve it.

Author: Peter Lapsley

Published: Fly-Fishing and Fly-Tying Magazine (UK) - July 2011

Thanks for reading! Lucy

PERSONS OF INTEREST

Ben Havens
Hatchery Manager
Bennett Spring Fish Hatchery
26142 Hwy 64A
Lebanon, Mo 65536
417-532-4418 x1062


Craig Fuller
Fisheries Management Biologist
417-532-7612 x 224
craig.fuller@mdc.mo.gov


Patricia Chambers
Bennett Spring Nature Center
26250 Hwy 64A
Lebanon, MO 65536
(: 417-532-3925| 6: 417-532-7006
www.mostateparks.com


Operation Game Thief Hotline, 1-800-392-1111.



Dallas County Conservation Agent Matt Hitchings and Ryan Wood
Matt.Hitchings@mdc.mo.gov (link sends e-mail) or at (417) 733-3876

Ryan.Wood@mdc.gov (link sends e-mail) or at (417) 733-0286.




Conservation agents for Laclede County
Jarrad.Jewell@mdc.mo.gov (link sends e-mail) or 417-718-1111

Jarad.Milligan@mdc.mo.gov (link sends e-mail) or 417-288-8744


Trout Cam At Bennett Spring State Park https://mostateparks.com/content/trout-cam

Mike Sapp Photo

Mike Sapp Photo