A group of FATC members made a trip to the Spring River in northern Arkansas (just across the Missouri border). Sterling Short, Harold Bates, Derrik Kassebaum, Bill Keenum, Dan Staggenborg, Brian Ellis, and Mike Daniel, drove the extra 2 hours past Licking to Mammoth Springs, AR. The weather was ….well…chilly….What a difference a few weeks makes.
At the beginning of the month the temperatures were between 70s and 50s. By the end of November temps were high in the 50s & lows in the 20s. Being a hearty bunch, we bundled up and made the best of it. As before, we stayed at a cabin of a friend, right on the Spring River where we could walk out the back porch to trout fishing.
A little background on the Spring River: In addition to being a great trout fishing spot, it’s a VERY popular floating and party river in the warmer swimming months. It’s stocked by a nearby hatchery, so the locals freely come and usually keep their catch. However, during the spring and fall/early winter months it provides the opportunity for excellent fishing, especially as big browns move upstream.
We arrived between 10 and 11am, spending the first day fishing the couple hundred yards behind the cabin and nearby. There are some fast riffles above and some flatter but moving water that goes down to an island where Harold and Derrik made their way. Derrik caught a dozen on a chartreuse mop fly and a few other fish were picked up by the other guys. Unfortunately, none were of any great size.
An interesting thing happened that first afternoon. Harold inadvertently dropped his phone in the river while putting it in his pocket after taking a picture. He didn’t discover it until later and was ready to give up on it. Derrik, with the help of Sterling, and Mike Daniel with his spotlight were able to recover it in about a foot of water a couple hours later as dark depended on them. After putting the phone in a bowl of dry rice, the darn thing even held a charge and worked fine the rest of the trip !
Sterling treated us to a gourmet dinner of spinach pasta with Halibut in wine, butter & capers plus salad. Brian provided cherry pie for dessert. An attempt at night fishing for those “big, bad browns” fell flat (yet again) !
The second day, Wednesday, Brian Ellis, and Mike Daniel met and fished with well-known Spring River guide, Mark Crawford. The remainder of us had planned to do our “fish/float” that day but since it was cold so early, we delayed the planned start until noon. Instead, we explored the other accesses by car. When we stopped by the Mammoth Spring visitor center, the attendant told us that he had experienced excellent fishing just below the hatchery dam on the left fork up the river. Several of the guys were anxious to fish that spot and took off.
Sterling had pretty good luck below the hatchery outflow on that branch picking up five trout in that spot. He very generously let me fish in that area while he moved farther upstream, and I picked up one pretty nice trout maybe 15 inches long. A little while later Sterling came down and said he had no luck at all below the falls as wading was very difficult due to big boulders.
Our plan to meet back at the cabin at noon and takeoff for our fish/float was overtaken by events. As a result, we didn’t embark on our fishing float in kayaks until nearly 1:30 pm. Knowing that in late November the sun starts setting below the hills between 3:30 and 4:15, we had a long way to go.
Undaunted we took off from behind the cabin and began our float, stopping at various places along way. Two of the guys were brand new floaters with little or no experience of kayaking in fast moving water. (Hey, what could possibly go wrong?) One new floater commented that after about 300 yards he was just starting to get comfortable in the kayak. It doesn’t seem like a good idea to say such things out loud, and sure enough, within about 30 feet he hung up on a rock that was barely submerged in the fast water. He did pretty good job getting off that rock by taking his paddles apart and using them as ski poles. Feeling relieved about getting free from that hang-up, he drifted down about another 30 feet and got caught up again ! From then on things went pretty smoothly for that floater !
We stopped at various spots along the way knowing that we were really under the gun time wise, so we didn’t get to fish them for the amount of time that we wanted. Several of the places that had yielded fish on the previous trip we just had to pass by.
We did catch fish along the way, although we didn’t have the kind of luck that they were hoping for at the falls where other FATC guys had caught fish before. The light was getting low, so we decided not to spend much time there. As we were heading downstream, we heard one of our FATC floaters yelling he had lost his paddle. Luckily, Sterling was nearby and was able to retrieve it for him. By the time we reached the takeout at Bayou access everyone was pretty tired, and the dark was coming on quickly.
We made our way back to the cabin for happy hour and lots of stories over a hearty dinner of ham string beans and potatoes capped off with apple pie that Brian had bought.
Mike and Brian had plenty of stories about the terrific day they had. Brian caught two very nice size brown trout and a large rainbow. Between Brian and Mike, they caught nearly 70 fish. The really good fishing started on the 2nd half of their journey with Mark, from the Bayou access to just above Saddler Falls.
One of the floaters confessed that at one spot that afternoon, he pulled his kayak up along the bank and was fishing for about five minutes when he looked around and noticed that his kayak was missing ! It had floated a couple hundred yards downstream, and he was able to hustle along the bank to a place where it had lodged itself and (luckily) was able to retrieve it. So effective was his recovery, we wouldn’t have known unless he had told us. Needless to say, everyone slept well that night after a really tough day of fishing and floating.
Thursday was to be our full, last full day of fishing. Derrik and Harold met up with the guide Mark Crawford and fished with him. The other 5 of us drove down to Riverside Resort campground resort and fished there. Sterling, Dan, and Bill fished above the campground and eventually encountered our friends floating down with the guide. The guide told us that area above the campground was considered a fishing “dead zone.” Dan was able to pick up 4 fish in that area using black zebra midge and Bill found a spot above some falls that had an underwater ledge upstream where the fish hung out. Bill was able to pull three trout out using the streamer; a game changer, I believe.
Sterling continued to work his way down river across the front of the campground. There was a lot of moss and grass but on the far side of the river that was a little 10-15-foot-wide chute where the water went through unimpeded and held trout. Sterling caught three or four in that fast-moving water while working downstream
Brian and Mike made their way across the river at the boat ramp where the fish were stocked and found an area on the far side about 100 yards downstream where the two of them did well; first stripping a streamer and then stripping a brown mohair leech. They caught around 30 fish between them.
Back at the cabin, we snacked and had another happy hour. Harold and Derrik related what fun day they had with Mark. (He is very knowledgeable and entertaining guy). They had caught around 30 trout between them and enjoyed it.
We held our Fellowship dinner at Riverbend restaurant where we had a jovial time. Back at the cabin we enjoyed listening to each other talk about our favorite hacks and fishing tips. Brian demonstrated how easy it was to tie a dropper on with a small tag without using much tippet by employing his Stonfo Elite hackle pliers. More joke telling, friendly ribbing, fishing talk and stories filled the remainder of the evening until we all headed to bed worn out (again) and preparing for our trip back towards St. Louis. <Keywords to inside jokes: “Halibutitus” and “Kneesles”…>
Many of us decided to stop by Montauk Friday morning to visit the rest of our FATC buddies even if just for part of the day, to attend the graduation for two new FATC members, Raul and Bob. We caught up with our FATC friends on the stream and later for lunch. Those who went enjoyed the day at Montauk. After 4 days of fishing and joking, we wondered how much more fellowship can a guy stand?
All in all, a great trip. Everyone said they would like to go back and visit the area again now that we’re getting to know our way around. It looks like more FATC trips to the Spring River will be in the future.
Submitted by DanStag (Dan Staggenborg) 12/06/2022
