5/21/2007

Squirrel, stream black bass seasons open May 26

The wait is almost over for Missourians longing for meals with fried squirrel and broiled bass as their centerpieces.

JEFFERSON CITY-Get out your rods, reels, shotguns and cast-iron cookware. Squirrel season and bass season in Ozark streams are almost here.

Missouri's seasons for hunting squirrels and catching and keeping black bass both open on the fourth Saturday in May. This year that is May 26. Squirrel season runs through Feb. 15, the while bass season continues through the end of February.

The bag limit on squirrels is six gray or fox squirrels per day. The possession limit is 12.

Bass regultions are more complicated. From March 1 through the Friday before the fourth Saturday in May, you can only keep smallmouth, largemouth and spotted bass caught in streams if you are:
* north of the south bank of the Missouri River,
* in that portion of southeast Missouri south and east of Cape Girardeau following Highways 74 and 25, U.S. Highways 60, 67 and 160 and the west bank of the Little Black River to the Arkansas state line, or
* on the St. Francis River downstream from Wappapello Dam.

In the rest of the state-essentially the Ozarks-black-bass fishing is strictly catch-and-release from March 1 until the fourth Saturday in May.

Black bass may be caught and kept year-round on the Mississippi River and on impoundments statewide, subject to local creel and length limits.

The Missouri Department of Conservation tailors black bass regulations to individual lakes and streams in an effort to produce the best possible fishing. To find regulations for a particular area, check the 2007 Summary of Missouri Fishing Regulations, available wherever fishing permits are sold. The same information is available online at www.missouriconservation.org/2115.

-Jim Low-