Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations saw some nice ponds in missouri

folks, not sure if anyone is looking for a place to move or retire...BUT...an fyi...i just drove up and back from mtn. home arkansas where i live up to muscatine iowa and went pheasant hunting. now, ....i saw some ddddaaannndy ponds from 1-10 acres...a few in the 40 acre range or so along hwy 19 in southern/mid missouri ..i think around the Herman area...so my point is. if someone is looking for a place to retire and buy some property that may hold a good pond...you might want to check out that area. i think prices of acreage are reasonable...and the soil types looked good for holding ponds... just an fyi if anyone is interested.

if anyone flies planes, anyone out there interested in looking into a biiiig trac of land and possibly making a massive lake. be nice to have a 500-1500 acre place with a little landing strip/runway, a 50-100 acre lake...deer woods, turkey land... cabin on it. just curious. that's just my dream someday, i'm sure somebody out there may have a similar dream. i know there are a lot of lakes in texas, but if someone in illinois or around the mid missouri area would be interested, let's talk. i could fly or drive to mid missouri at a more reasonable time than i could to the famous "tank central". i couldn't afford it now, but it's always a good idea to start looking early.

also, different topic...maybe we should create a "trade hunt/fish/whatever section!", but i was wondering if anyone up north in the pheasant/big corn fed deer area would be interested in trading a hunt for fishing or waterskiing trip etc. there are people from all over on this web site...and i love to meet people with similar interests...so if anyone is ever near mtn. home arkansas, i'd love to show them around, or take them on a great small mouth fishing trip on famous crooked creek or trout fishing on the White River or water skiing. anyone else out there on "exchange trips" or stuff like that? if there is much of an interest, we may need a topic such as "exchange trips" so that if someone from illinois happens to be going to mesquite texas...they can post a message like "anyone in or near mesquite texas want to go/take me fishing" etc. and someone in texas may write "i want to go pheasant hunting...anyone out there want to take me?" just a thought....any other folks have any comments.... For me, i live 5-10 miles from beatiful Bull Shoals and Norfork lake, and would enjoy taking folks with their kids or whatever fishing or out to the lake skiing. mark

Mark:

Strange coincidence...I'm sitting in Muscatine, Iowa, right now. I work at Bandag and live about 25 mins S.W of here. How'd the hunting go for you and where did you hunt?

I have 50 acres (just about finished with the 2 acre pond) that's mostly grass, with several thousand small trees I've planted since '97. Opening day, we (2 of us) only managed 4 birds...Sunday we got 5 more. All this on my lonely 50 acres. Food plots must be working, but they say Iowa's had a great year and all crops around me were picked week before season.

I live in NW Missouri, and we have TONS of ponds. It's truly incredible. Missouri has something around 400,000 ponds statewide. In Carroll Co., the US Govt (NRCS) is actively building Pl-566 structures. These ponds range in size from 3-10 acres but some are bigger, and they are totally free. Most people know that NRCS does cost-share on pond construction, but these PL-566 structures are totally free. They are built for flood control purposes. I was talking to the District Conservationist (NRCS) about a month ago, and he said there were several people turning down the PL-566 projects. Seems they just don't want to inundate the acreage. These particular "watershed" lakes (PL-566) I'm talking about are all in the Hurricane Creek watershed of Carroll Co. Similar projects are going on in other counties but I'm just familiar with Carroll County because it's one of my assigned counties. This area has absolutely phenomenal turkey and deer hunting. These structures are in the uplands portion of the county. The floodplain portion includes the Grand and Missouri Rivers where some excellent waterfowl opportunities exist. Both rivers also harbor abundant channel catfish fisheries and some bruiser flatheads. If I had any money, I'd buy a piece of land in this watershed just to get the pond built. Land goes for about $1000/acre. The average cost of one of these PL-566 structures is 45K; your cost....nothing. Keep in mind that the PL-566 program is a special program that doesn't exist in every county, and it shouldn't be confused with the typical cost-share ponds that NRCS builds for erosion purposes. If you like to hunt and fish, you can't go wrong with this particular county, particularly if the piece of land is eligible for a PL-566 structure. Once the pond is built, my agency (Missouri Department of Conservation) will stock the pond for free. Working as a fisheries biologist for a state agency is a cool gig, but my paycheck only allows me to live vicariously through others.....at least when owning a chunk of land and a cool pond is involved.

Good idea on the 'exchange a trip' thought. In fact, one of the guys that routinely posts on this site is coming up to bow hunt with me this week. I've never met him, but he likes to shoot big deer, so what the heck? I have been told, however, that other websites cater to just that idea. I guess that there's always the chance that your guest could be a pyschopath, but most folks in this country, especially folks with our interest in the outdoors, are good people. So you say you got big smallmouths??

Matt, i went up to muscatine and went pheasant hunting with my brother in law and his boss (they work for the Farm Service Agency...i think it used to be the ASCS agency.) anyway, we went from mountain home, arkansas to muscatine iowa...took us about 8 hours on the way up and 9 hours on the way back because of some octoberfest or something like that in herman missouri or somewhere like that...blocked up traffic. anyway, i went to harding university...a small private christian college in searcy arkansas....that is where i met my best bud and best man in my wedding....you really ought to hook up with this feller (assuming you aren't a psychopath!!) his name is alan evans...he's the new dentist there in town, and he grew up there. depending on how old you are and if you grew up in muscatine, you probably went to school with one of his many siblings (and his dad was principal/superintendent for a while there i think) he's a great feller, loves to hunt and would be a good connection for you, or just swing buy his office sometime... His dental practice is next to that new store Elbert something or other...big new store..can't remember the name. anyway, we killed a few wild birds...then rain was forecast, so we went to a preserve where he has a membership and killed about 22 birds. fun, but i'd rather do it the wild, non preserve way. but after i drove that far..i just wanted to kill some birds!!! we wound up heading back home to ark. sunday a.m. because rain forecast for sun/mon/tues. anyway, good luck. holler at alan. we plan to come back up there the first snow weekend to hunt pheasants again.

shawn...thanks for the info on missouri...i was totally impressed with the "pondage" in mid missouri. and the free stuff makes it sound even better. let me know if you hear of a "pondable" trac maybe 300 plus acres. i would prefer some running water thru it or springs to make a 50 plus acre pond. i'd either need it near an airport or a flat enough area to build a grass strip. i'm really surprised the property in that area is 1 grand per acre. i'm about 10 miles from the southern missouri border and propert runs 500 plus per acre. anyway...just dreamin

yes, we have pretty good small mouth fishing here, especially on crooked creek. one of my partneres has a 1500 acre farm with 6 miles of front on crooked creek....grrreeeaaatttt small mouth fishing..but fickle. now don't get me wrong...if you want some real small mouth, head up north, but if you want to catch a bunch and not have to fight mosquitos....i got the place!!!

going bow hunting huh....sounds great. the nice thing about missouri is you can just pay for the license... in iowa i think you have to "draw" for a buck license...anyway.... love this website; i agree with you, most of the folks i imagine that have the interest we do on this web site most likely aren't pyschopaths, but if they are, we got a lotttt of hungry catfish on the bottom of some deep fishin holes around here if they pull some crazy crap on us!!!

ha, mark

matt, i called alan...the name of that big new store near his office is Elder Beerman...not sure how to spell it..but his office is...if you are looking at the front of the elder b. store...his dentist office it on some road to the right of it about a few hundred yards. now, I just hope you aren't some crazy psychopath!!! but i'm giving you the benefit of the doubt...haven't noticed fellow PondBosser's being bad folks at all....exept for that Bob Lusk feller...you gotta watch him....i heard he's got a crraaaaazzzzyyy eye; just kidding, all good folks on this site. well, better run or my wife is going to feed me to the catfish!!

oh, if you do meet my buddy alan and go hunting with him...he is very safety and rule abiding conscious...so just keep that in mind (plus i don't want you whackin my best bud with bird shot in his rump!!!) he's a hard core hunter though, gotta warn ya! take care, and safe hunting and fishing. mark