Welcome to the Ozark Fly Fishers

Founded 1971
A Missouri 501(c)3 not-for-profit corporation

Another Fine Barbecue

Our Bar-B-Que at Tillis park, prepared food for 90 people and 52 attended. We grilled 36 hamburgers with only 1 left, 54 bratwurst and only had 3 left.

This was a nice event, and we saved hundreds of dollars by doing the cooking ourselves compared to the vendor in previous years.

Casting lessions on the pond were great as always - Thank you Brian Ellis!

Also, Chris Bohigian thank you for getting your husband George, a long time member to get out and attend. We are very grateful.

Keep on clicking away! We had 110 clicks in June. We are kinda clickish, I guess.

Casting for a Leader

Fellow club members,

As the seasons shift and we enjoy the long evenings on the water, it’s time to turn our thoughts toward one of the highlights of our club’s year-the Annual Banquet. It’s an evening we all look forward to: great food, fine company, raffles, live auctions, fish tales, and maybe even a few lies about the one that got away.

But, here’s the thing- we need someone to help make all this happen.

We’re currently seeking a volunteer to step into the role Banquet Chair. This position isn’t about doing everything yourself; It’s about helping guide a team of willing hands to bring the banquet together. If you’ve ever enjoyed an evening of laughter, raffles, and community thanks to this event, you know how important it is to our club culture.

The Banquet Chair is responsible for:

Helping organizing the raffle, auctions and donations. The venue, food and bar options are taken care by other volunteers. Between all the other help, it promises to be a smooth, fun, and memorable evening.

You’ll have plenty of support-past chairs are happy to share their wisdom, and the board is ready to help every step of the way. Whether you’re a seasoned organizer or just someone with a passion for the club and a knack for getting things done, this is a great opportunity to make a big impact.

If you’re interested or even just curious, please reach out to me. Stepping up for a role like this is how we keep our club strong, connected, and thriving.

Steve Antonic

President. Ozark Fly Fishers

314-401-8874

sjantonic@charter.net

BANQUET REMINDER

Dear Members

The time has come to mark your calendars, saving the date for our annual fundraising banquet.

As you know, our annual fundraising banquet is our clubs largest fundraising eventof the year, providing us the opportunity to sponsor our many events throughout the entire year.

Next year’s banquet and silent auction is on Saturday, January 17th, 2026.

The banquet will be held at the same location as years past. Andre’s at Sunset Hills 13366 West Watson Road Sunset Hill, Missouri 63127

This year’s cost will remain the same as last year, $40.00 per person which includes a nice meal, desert, and open bar. The event will include raffles, silent auction as well as a live auction.

We encourage all of you to bring your spouse, guest and even friends, who might not be club members, to join us for a great night out.

Please mark your calendars, make plans to attend and support your club. Reservation forms will be made available in the near future.

Thank you and hope to see you there.

Nice article on Tom Hargroves shop:

https://terrain-mag.com/tom-hargrove/

Bennet Springs Update

Hatchery project completion date is now estimated to be January 2026

The list of upcoming events:

July 11-13 - CANCELLED Annual Missouri Stream Team Outing at Montauk

July 24 - Ben Havens - Bennett Spring Hatchery

Aug 21 - Logan Huff, Morgan Guss of The Diamond State Fly Co Arkansas

Sept 25 - Jeff Mace, Feather Craft

October 9-12 Taneycomo Outing

October 23 - Joe Oelke - Urban fishing in St. Louis

November - Catch & Release Outing

December 11 - Christmas Party

January 17 - Banquet

February 21 - All Day meeting with Son Tau

Thanks,

Paul Jackson

CONSERVATION EVENTS AND OPPORTUNITIES

If you have questions about the following events,

contact Scott Darrough at: 314-560-1335 or swdarrough@yahoo.com

ATTENTION! – OZARK FLY FISHERS NEEDS YOU!

CONSERVATION RELATED POSITIONS THAT NEED TO BE FILLED.

LOWG – LEAGUE OF WATERSHED GUARDUANS BOARD MEMBER TO REPRESENT FOR OZARK FLY FISHERS.

- Dan Rasch resigned from this position after holding for several years.

MISSOURI STREAM TEAM CAPTAIN FOR BLUE SPRINGS CREEK, BOURBON, MO

- Glenn Bish dedicated many years of monitoring to this location.

MISSOURI STREAM TEAM CAPTAIN FOR MILL CREEK, NEWBURG, MO

- Bill Leslie dedicated many years of monitoring to this location

July 26, 2025: 29th Annual Watershed Celebration –

Meramec State Park - by invitation from Stream Teams United

Do not miss this “Grand Picnic”! There will be opportunities for members to volunteer for casting and fly-tying instruction, tying safety pin flies and manning the Stream Team macroinvertebrate display. This event provides an opportunity to promote conservation and recruit new members. It is also a fun time.

https://www.streamteamsunited.org/watershed-celebration-picnic.html

August 23, 2025: 58th Annual Operation Clean Stream –

Byrnes Mill City Park - by invitation from the Trashmanian Devils Stream Team 3797

Ozark members are invited to attend this clean-up of the Meramec watershed. Details will follow in the months to come.

Shore Lunches Usually Enhance a Fishing Trip. . .

I have taken a lot of fishing trips over the years in the Missouri Ozarks and one of the things that, in my opinion, really enhances a fishing trip is having a great shore lunch. Even if the fishing is poor, the trip will be much, much better with good food. And I have tried to perfect that shore lunch with a variety of unexpected menus, such as grilled lamb chops, marinated beef tenderloin or some other quality meal cooked from scratch right on the shore. By in large, these meals get prepared as intended and by in large, they are appreciated, but there is always that exception, isn’t there?

The exception I am thinking about was during a fishing trip one afternoon on the Little Piney near Newburg, Missouri years ago. My fishing buddy that day was Bill Selby, a long time friend. Selby is a great fishing companion because he never complains about anything. He doesn’t complain about the quality of the fishing, he doesn’t’ complain about the rain that always shows up, he doesn’t complain about the choice of the stream we are floating and most importantly, he never complains about my shore lunches.

Simply put, he can and will eat just about anything and enjoy it as if it were his last

supper. As an example of his laissez-faire approach to food, one time while we were duck hunting, he was surprised (and delighted) to find a piece of half-eaten jerky in the hunting coat that he had borrowed from someone else. The fact that this particular piece of jerky had been gnawed on by someone else—and abandoned mid-stream for some unknown reason—did not bother Selby one bit. He simply blew on it (apparently to sanitize it) and then down the hatch it went, no questions asked. See what I mean?

On this particular occasion on the Little Piney, we had stopped to eat lunch at one of my favorite spots. The most remarkable thing about this spot was that the beach where we stopped was composed of fine, almost white sand. Back in those days, I often cooked Chinese food as the shore lunch. I had lived in Asia for a while and learned how to cook with a wok. Generally, these Chinese meals were pretty good, if I must say so myself, and the best thing about all this was that, with the wok, the meal could be ready within a few minutes. So while Selby fished, I got the fire going and settled in to cook. This particular Chinese dish I was intending to cook had bacon as the main ingredient.

For whatever reason, the fire under the wok got hotter quicker than I anticipated. Before I knew it, the bacon was burning and needed to get removed from the wok immediately. Instinctively, I grabbed the closest thing I could find. Unfortunately, I grabbed a styrofoam plate. I tossed the hot bacon onto the plate and you can probably guess what happened next—the bacon

immediately melted through the styrofoam and fell into the fine white sand below. This was definitely not a good development. But if there were a silver lining to this shore lunch malpractice, it was that Selby did not see it. He was still fishing. Not that it really mattered. As I say, Selby will eat just about anything but even Selby probably does not like culinary surprises that involve sand and styrofoam. But we were about to find out for sure because the bacon was a necessary ingredient for this particular dish. So I decided to “strip” each piece of bacon with my fingers and toss the bacon back into the wok. I kept telling myself that Selby couldn’t care less and besides, I was pretty hungry. I also decided that rather than going into great detail with him over what had happened ahead of time, I would see what he had to say after the first bite and if he ate it without complaint, I would too. I felt I owed him that much on the deal.

When the meal was ready, I called Selby over to the table. (Back in those days, the “table" consisted of a roll-up table with an ice cooler on each side so that the two of us would be facing each other as we ate.) As he sat down and prepared to “dig in”, Selby had his usual grin—not an Alfred E. Newman type of grin with lots of teeth and a goofy look—but rather a more subtle grin with no teeth showing and the corners of the mouth slightly turned up. I waited to see how he would react to the first bite. In the fork went. Now, even at four feet away, I could hear his teeth grinding on the sand in his mouth. And to my amazement, he was still smiling on that first swallow.

But now it was my turn. I immediately noticed the sand. I was surprised Selby could not hear me grinding away on my first bite but he was already on his second bite and things were probably pretty noisy in his head too. But it was the styrofoam that really hit me like a tank. Let’s face it: you will never hear your waiter in a gourmet restaurant tell you, while reciting the evening specials, that the beef Wellington has a slight hint of styrofoam. I can see why the EPA wanted to ban the burning of styrofoam, a substance far too toxic for this plant. But now it was too late. Selby is already close to wolfing down his portion and I promised myself I would eat it if he did, no matter what.

I will spare you the gruesome details of what happened to me a half hour later. And Selby? He was fine—business as usual—no complaints and still wearing that subtle grin. Things were so bad for me that he had to paddle the rest of the trip and to add injury to insult, he had to drive my truck back to St. Louis, laughing all the way and enjoying my “situation”. And then he got even. I had fallen asleep on the way home and when I woke up, the truck was stopped and Selby was gone. I soon realized we were in the parking lot of the White Castle on I-44 near Fenton. This could mean only one thing. Selby would be returning any minute with two dozen sliders--probably the last thing I needed to smell right about then. Let’s just say he enjoyed the next 15 minutes immensely, describing for me every bite as he polished off the entire bag, licking his fingers every three minutes and enjoying my misery on the other side of the truck.

Yes, I still cook shore lunches on my fishing trips, but you won’t find any styrofoam in my cooking gear.

Bill Hoagland

Lake Taneycomo Outing

October 9th, 10th and 11th 2025

Ozark Fly Fishers fall outing will be held at beautiful Lake Taneycomo the second weekend of October. Lodging has been arranged at Lilley’s Landing Resort. This has always been an enjoyable outing with the chance to catch some really large fish. We have reserved four cabins for Thursday, Friday and Saturday night October 9-11, 2025.

Lilley’s Landing has its own trout dock with jon boats that can be rented by the day. For those interested in renting boats or guide services, you can reach out to:

For those interested in renting boats or guide services, you can reach out to:

River Run Outfitters

Historic Hwy 165

Branson. MO 65616

1-417-332-0460

https://www.riverrunoutfitters.com

Lilley’s Landing

367 River Ln 2626

Branson, MO. 65616

1-(417)-334-6380

https://www.lilleyslanding.com /

Thanks, Ed!

Fly Casting Tip July 2025

Continuing a discussion of Lefty Kreh’s principles of fly casting. As a reminder the principles are:

1) “You must get the end of the fly line moving before you can make a back or forward cast.”

2) “Once the line is moving, the only way to load the rod is to move the casting hand at an ever-increasing speed and then bring it to a quick stop.”

3) “The line will go in the direction the rod tip speeds up and stops—more specifically. It goes in the direction that the rod straightens when the rod hand stops.”

4) “The longer the rod travels on the back and forward casting strokes, the less effort is required to make the cast.

Regarding principle #2 – another way to say it is - use a smooth acceleration ending in a hard stop.

This applies regardless of the length of the casting stoke. A short stroke and only the tip of the rod will bend. As stroke length increases the rod bends more into the mid and even butt section of the rod. The power of the cast comes from a combination of rod bend and rod/hand speed. The power is in the stop not in the start. The acceleration should be smooth. The more velocity achieved the more the power generated by the stop. Lefty says it this way in his 2008 book, “Casting with Lefty Kreh”.

“The faster you accelerate the rod hand in the first portion of the casting stroke and the faster the hand speeds up and stops, the more energy the rod stores and the faster the line travels.” This principle explains why body strength has little to do with casting success.

The rod will do the work if it is handled correctly.

Bill Armon