A gaggle of FATC FlyFishers decided to celebrate the end of July with a trip to Bennett Spring
Attendees: Scott Payne, Jim Craig. Vern Preston, Ken Welter, Denny Garner, Bob Hassett, Dan Staggenborg (the author).
Steve Baker and Don Varner had stayed the night nearby and joined us there. A friend Jeff Cohen, from Rolla came also. In the afternoon Matt McClure and Bob Palisch who were floats the Niangua the next day showed up and got in on the fun.
So on July 31, 2024 with temperatures forecast in the mid 90’s we descended upon the park. We congregated at our usual parking spot near the restrooms just below the waterfall at the Holland Dam hole.
Many of the guys wet waded which was very comfortable.
The water level was a tad on the low side, and the stream had lots of vegetation in the form of subsurface moss, which is a natural thing in mid to late summer. The stream had a fair bit of stringy didymo (aka rock snot) in the stream.
Several guys started at the spring, Although there were fish in the area, the fishing was not very good. In the 3 hours the (uh, stubborn) author fished there only 3 fish were even observed being taken.
As for the author, 3 hours of trying 2-3 different nymphs, a grey scud, 2 different soft hackle flies and 3 different dry flies only yielded a single take on a dry fly which ended up getting foul hooked in the side fin.
No so good, although things got better in the afternoon.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, at lunch, that is, guys reported decent success on various white nymphs, purple midge. Cracklebacks worked particularly well, either floated or stripped
Steve Baker reported he greatly enjoyed the “cat and mouse game” of floating a size 22 Griffiths gnat over the moss beds to entice takes from the trout.
Several of the guys went down to below the stone bridge and enjoyed excellent fishing, as far as numbers went.
However, it should be noted that most of the fish were in the 10-12” range. Very few fish any larger were taken, which shows the impact the hatchery construction is having.
The most productive setup was the “3 stooges” rig, so nicknamed by Scott Payne. This is a yellow egg pattern, a little white thing and a House of Payne fly floated under an indicator.
For those now familiar with the”little white thing”, it is a small sparkly white unweighted fly tied in the manner of a Barr’s emerger.
All in all, everyone had a good time and caught fish.
Don Varner was very happy to catch one on a blue mop fly that Steve Baker had “unloaded” (dumped) on him a long time ago. You see, as Don proved, fishing ability, skill and persistence will always triumph in the end, no matter what fly used.
For dinner, at the suggestion of Jim Craig, we made our way to a new place, the Sirloin Stockade in Rolls for an excellent fellowship dinner. Many of us got the buffet which had a wide variety of foods, all of which were satisfying. This might be a future “go to” dinner spot.
We all arrived home tired, around dark after a long, but fun day with good buddies.
