Buck Hollow Sporting Goods - click or touch to visit their website Midwest Habitat Company

MO River backwaters bowfishing

Kansasdeerslayer

Kansasdeerslayer

PMA Member
Down here around KC, the tributaries of the MO river have been beyond incredible for bowfishing. The grass carp are on a feeding frenzy and the asian carp seem to be everywhere. We've been hitting it pretty hard on the weekends for the last month. Here are a few of the highlights...

DSC05047.jpg


DSC05072.jpg



My brother's first fish with archery gear!
DSC05057.jpg



My friend Ken
DSC05046.jpg


My son's first grassie!
DSC05066.jpg



My Dad's first fish ever with archery gear!!
2011-06-05_12-38-29_814.jpg
 
WOW, that looks like a blast!! I can't believe some of the size on those things. The gar are pretty sweet too.
 
Incredible, I need to do that sometime!!!!!! SO, I'm just curious.... What in the world do you guys do with all those things?!?!?!?! :) I wanna know!
 
Sligh1 said:
Incredible, I need to do that sometime!!!!!! SO, I'm just curious.... What in the world do you guys do with all those things?!?!?!?! :) I wanna know!
Click to expand...


Some of the grass carp and all of the asian carp are given to some Chinese friends of mine for consumption. I clean most of the gar to eat. Alot of the local catfishermen hit us up for chunk bait, we've given these guys alot of fish. The rest goes for trap line bait and a guy who has a turtle farm to feed his snappers.
 
Kansasdeerslayer said:
I clean most of the gar to eat.
Click to expand...


I never knew you could eat those things! I would be interested in how you clean and prepare those things. I usually leave them for the coons! :)
Great bunch of fish and its great to see all the "Firsts" that are going on there. :way:
 
Skully said:
I never knew you could eat those things! I would be interested in how you clean and prepare those things. I usually leave them for the coons! :)
Great bunch of fish and its great to see all the "Firsts" that are going on there. :way:
Click to expand...


I clean em and eat em just like a catish. Take a pair of tin snips and make a cut down the center of the back and down the sides behind the gills. Take the catfish skinners and remove the skin. Then filet them out just like a catfish. You will have a boneless white filet as long as a deer backstrap. Cut into eatable portions, pan fry it and enjoy. If you get the meat really wet it get mushy so we do a quick rinse and dab off the water with paper towels. It is much better fresh than frozen and thawed.
 
Been back out on the river this week. Monday my buddy Ken and I endured 7 hours of 100 degree heat and hammered and bunch of nice grassies and bigheads. Then Wednesday my son and I went back and shot some more grassies, bigheads, and a nice buffalo.

DSC05225-1.jpg


DSC05240.jpg
 
I wish we could bowfish the floodwater up here in western Iowa. The Corp of Engineers is threatening a $30,000 fine and confiscation of boat and equiptment on anyone caught on the flooded feilds, even if they are a mile or more from the Mo. river.They are arresting people boating across their own feilds to reach their flooded houses. Whats the law down there? It sucks, I can only imagine how great it could be other than the bugs.
 
I don't officially know what the law is, but we have had corp guys in helicpters friendly waving to us and had corp guys on JD gators driving the levees looking for problem areas stop and chat with us. They told us troller only/ no wake is OK, no beating on the levees with wakes using the big motor which we gladly adide by. I would hate to be the guy that caused a levee to break because I was running up and down the river. The corp guys we have talked with have been super nice and encouraged us to kill as many of these grass and asian carp we can.
 
I think I am most impressed by the tiny gar in the father/son pic! That thing would make a tough shot! :way:
 
Kansasdeerslayer- I checked again with the corp of engineers headquarters in Omaha for our area to find out if we can even go out bowfishing on flooded private land fields with a boat and trolling motor and was told its actually the US Coast Guard thats enforcing the no boat ban on any water connected to the Mo river all the way down to river mile marker 221 east of KC. I guess we will have to wait until the river goes down and traps the fish in the fields or they open the river back up to boats.Anyone else been out on the floodwater?
 
Skully said:
I think I am most impressed by the tiny gar in the father/son pic! That thing would make a tough shot! :way:
Click to expand...

My son shot that little guy, it was swimming by with a minnow in its mouth and my boy said he couldn't resist. I was pretty impressed, he is becoming quite the shooter.

6x6, thanks for the info. I am well inside the 221 mile marker. I better talk to some people before I make another trip out there. No fish slaying is worth losing my boat over. I would have to head east another hour to get into water thats not restricted. I have seen a lot of boats on this river in the last month, so if it is off limits, they sure aren't doing a very good job of informing anyone.
 
I have been searching the web for an hour and can't find anything definitive. I can't find anything at all on USCG's website. Several news articles say that the MO river itself is completely closed from St. Louis to Sioux City, including flooded backwaters and any connected waters. I would like to know what their definitions of backwaters and connected waters are, because from what I have found that doesn't mean other rivers. Tributaries are still open for use in a few articles I read. I assume that any waters directly connected to the main channel of the MO river are off limits. I have been staying in the tributaries, not getting any closer than a half mile from the confluence. I will keep digging until I know for sure, but I would think someone who has seen me on the rivers would've said something to me by now if I was breaking any laws.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom