Some of the prettiest water in the Ozarks, and some of the best canoeing and fishing, can be found on Big Sugar Creek, a jewel of a stream that meanders through the hill country near Pineville, Mo.
Big Sugar flows clear as tap water. That transparency gives river runners fine views of the smallmouth bass that prowl the bedrock and gravel stream bed.
Float Big Sugar
Canoe and kayak trips take place on Big Sugar Creek from Powell, Mo., downstream to Pineville, Mo., depending on water level. Float conditions have been good all summer on Big Sugar, said Rick Horton, fisheries biologist with the Missouri Department of Conservation.
The stream is easy to navigate and suitable for paddlers of all skill levels.
Information: Big Elk Camp and Canoe, 417-223-4635.
So clear is Big Sugar Creek that boats cast shadows on the bottom. Canoeing this lovely stream is joy enough. Catching dozens of smallmouth bass makes a fisherman downright giddy.
Our trio of floaters savored it all during a trip down Big Sugar on Aug. 20. Bob Ross and Grimsley Graham, both of Rogers, and your faithful outdoors reporter set out in two canoes for a 3.5-mile drift. We launched at the Crag 'O Lea bridge east of Pineville and fished our way to Big Elk Camp and Canoe outfitters, located where Big Sugar and Little Sugar join to form the Elk River.
Mike Reynolds from Big Elk rode with us to our put-in at the bridge, then drove it back after we launched. The ride gave us a chance to quiz Reynolds about the fishing.
"It's been great," he said. "There's been a tremendous amount of people catching fish, and some pretty good sized ones, too."
We loaded gear into our canoes at the bridge on a gorgeous Thursday morning and set off down Big Sugar. We hadn't caught our first fish before Graham hopped out of the canoe to pick up some litter on the bank. We like to leave a stream cleaner than we got there, plus it increases our karma with the fish. A minute later Graham had our first smallmouth on the line.
Fish were eager to bite. We tallied close to 20 smallmouth bass the first mile of the float. A lot were small, but even the little guys fought big. Graham had the hot hand and caught fish after fish on an Arkie Crawling Fry made by Arkie Lures in Springdale. It looks like a big helgramite, with the body of a plastic worm that has legs from one end to the other. Tube baits and soft-plastic crawfish also worked.
Graham was on fire with that Crawling Fry and put a 13-inch smallmouth in the canoe. Size seemed to increase the farther we drifted. Big fish of the day was a 15.5-inch smallmouth that fought like a 5-pounder. We released all our fish, so back in the creek it went.
The beautiful water is some of the clearest in the Ozarks. Excellent water quality, plenty of forage and good habitat combine for superb fishing on Big Sugar, said Rick Horton, fisheries biologist with the Missouri Department of Conservation, when we chatted a few days after our trip.
"People have been able to float and fish on Big Sugar most of the summer, thanks to rain," he said.
A series of wing dikes meant the end of our float was near. We drifted to the spot where Big Sugar and Little Sugar creeks merge to form the Elk River. For grins I paddled a ways up Little Sugar and caught a smallmouth, just to say I caught fish on both rivers.
At the take-out we marveled at the great floating and fabulous fishing. We guess-timated our catch for the day at 70 smallmouths.
"A lot of those were 6-inch fish but they were sure fun to catch," Ross said.
Flip Putthoff can be reached at fputthoff@nwadg.com or on Twitter @NWAFlip
Sports on 09/03/2015