The cover photo is from a game camera set up by Jason Brooks. A front page story followed with information about using a game camera and several tips for how to set them up. Jason says they can be effective tools, but it is also part of the hunt to get out there and scout around with someone else to try to guess what deer season will be like.

Another story - in keeping with the deer season theme this month - tells about hunting in the Ozarks National Scenic Riverways. This national park is but one of many large public areas that may be hunted. There are about 80,000 acres and 130 river miles of land available to hunters. The complete story is repeated below.

Jim Featherston concluded his series on Black Hawk, an influential Indian who is associated with Missouri history and for whom a war was named.

The moon is not very favorable for the opening morning of deer season this year. It gets better as the season ages, but opening morning in places without a great deal of hunter activity may be slow going.

There's information on deer seasons and regulations, and Charlie Slovensky writes about the use of various deer calls. Jeremy Koerber writes about bagging his first deer completely on his own.

The acorn crop is generally very good again this year, which is good news for wildlife, but can make deer hunting difficult when deer do not travel much to feed.

A story on Elephant Rocks State Park cited it as a good place to go for people who want to get out but are nervous about going just anywhere during firearms deer season. There's a new trail section at Elephant Rocks.

Walt Fulps tells hunters how to handle a trophy deer to get a good looking mount. And Don Rathert tells about what a truly good deer hunt should be all about.

Bill Cooper changes the pace with a story about a young hunters who bags a redhead his first time out. Howard Helgenberg says Bennett Spring is a good place to trout fish - about the same distance for him from St. Louis and a friend from Kansas City.

Benefits of fishing small streams, close to home, are explored by Charley Schmidt. There's also the usual recipes, coming events, a sunrise/moonrise calendar, season run down and more.

Scouting to hunt the Ozark National Scenic Riverways

By Bob Todd
Looking for a place to hunt? The Ozark National Scenic Riverways offers over 80,000 acres of public hunting along the Current and Jacks Fork Rivers.
The east and central Ozarks has an abundance of public land for hunting. Between the Riverways, the Mark Twain National Forest, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers land and state conservation areas, you could be lost and step out of your truck in the middle of the night in most counties and stand a better than one-in-three chance of being on land you can hunt without asking anyone. As a citizen, you own it.
In this story, we’ll tell you about the Riverways.
Except for a stretch on the Jacks Fork at Eminence and a stretch on the Current at Van Buren, both sides of the rivers are open for hunting basically from Montauk State Park all the way to the Ripley County line above Doniphan. There are a few exceptions, but outside of the developed recreation areas, it is open to hunting for about 130 miles on both banks.
On the lower river, a gravel bar camp and a boat gives you access to miles of river bottom. Not long ago, hunters who used boats did not usually camp along the river in part because of requirements that a deer be checked the day it is killed.
But with the telecheck system, if you can find a location where you can get a cell phone signal, you can report your deer that way. A gravel bar camp is more practical now.
Of course you don’t have to boat to a place to hunt. There are plenty of places where you can drive into the river bottoms or near them, make camp and hunt. Or you can stay in a developed camp and travel out a short distance, by truck or boat to hunt. There’s commercial camps and motels too.
The upper rivers don’t give you the option of using a boat, generally. Unless water levels are good and you have a boat made for shallow running, you’d have to have above normal water levels to get around.
But . . . . as I ate lunch on a gravel bar at a slightly developed camp, I realized that just across the river from the camp was open to hunting. A person could paddle a canoe across, tie it up, and very probably find deer sign just a few yards from the river.
SCOUTING PLUS
It is no secret that north Missouri’s deer are more prolific, and when agricultural crops are harvested those deer are more concentrated. If you just want meat, that’s a good place to go – if you can get permission to hunt. But there’s little public land there.
If you want a bit of a wilderness experience with your hunt, complete with great scenery and a change of pace, the Riverways may be for you.
Scouting can be a special pleasure even if you plan to hunt another area.
Most public land in the Ozarks extends along timbered ridges. But the Riverways runs along the rivers, taking in the bottoms, tributary valleys, hillsides. Typically, roads go back to the river but do not run along it very far.
You’ll want to take highways that parallel the rivers, then explore small road that eventually get to the rivers.
Jerktail Landing may be an example.
It is a primitive area maintained by the Riverways, complete with a few picnic tables and a gravel boat launch area. Horse trail rides reach here too and there’s places to tie up horses and a restroom.
To reach Jerktail, you turn off Route 19 at the sign between Round Spring and Eminence and follow gravel roads back seven or eight miles. There are some other roads that fork off the main one. Some go to the river, some do not, but one goes to a Conservation Department firing range.
(Incidentally, while you can hunt in the Riverways, you can’t just shoot your gun. Sight it in before you get there.)
Depending on water level and the kind of boat you have, you could camp at Jerktail and range up or down the river. Or you could walk out of the developed area and commence hunting. Or you could cross over in a boat or canoe and hunt up a hollow on the east side of the river. Or you could camp at the river and drive back toward Highway 19 - most of the land along the way is part of Angeline Conservation Area - also public hunting land.
Some maps show an unimproved road reaching Jerktail from the other side. We tried it. There is a county road running east from Highway 19 between Round Spring and Sinkin Creek bridge. About three miles back this road, a trail turns off to the south. It starts out well enough, but becomes rougher and rougher. Four wheel drive is advisable. After seven miles I came to a fork in the road not shown on my map. Probably, one fork eventually gets to the river. Maybe both, but I’d had enough.
ATVs
Tempting as it may be to take an ATV and explore up and down the river valley, the Riverways (which is a national park) is not very friendly towards them. They are allowed only on maintained roads - if you can’t take a truck there, you can’t take an ATV. Furthermore, they must be registered with the state, have safety equipment including a safety flag and must have a permit in the county where they are operated. (Dent, Shannon or Carter Counties.)
Curiously, the so-called UTVs or side-by-side ATVs are not allowed at all.
The very fact that finding access to all parts of the river valleys is not easy makes the hunt potentially rewarding in other ways.
Want a big-racked buck? You may have a better chance here than in north Missouri. Deer in the Ozarks are not as prolific as they are up north and it is not necessary to keep the herd shot back here. As a result, a deer has a chance to live longer in the Ozarks. And age is the main thing needed for a buck to grow an impressive set of antlers.
We get the local weekly newspapers such as the Current Wave at Eminence, and we see some very impressive racks in the bragging photos.
BEST OF BOTH WORLDS
If you need a new place to hunt, consider the Riverways as a place to hunt in relative wilderness. A great setting for a deer hunting/deer camp tradition. Open the season there. If you still need deer meat after the opener, consider going to north Missouri. It may be hard to find a place to hunt there opening weekend, but landowners are a lot more agreeable after their own friends and family have had enough.
If you DO have a place to hunt in north Missouri, you may still want to plan a hunt in the Riverways for later. If you canoe here in summer, a deer camp can be a perfect way to experience the Riverways in another season.
And a scouting trip to the Riverways before season is bound to be a winner whether or not you find a place that suits you for hunting.
MAPS: The best map for a first scouting trip is the old Conservation Atlas. The new one shows MDC land, but not Riverways boundaries. The old one shows both and is on a scale that can get you started.
If you have only the new Atlas, you’ll need a Riverways map too. Once you’ve narrowed your search, by all means get topographic maps of the specific area from the Missouri Geologic Survey and sketch the Riverways boundaries on it. Some maps already show the boundary. (http://www.dnr.mo.gov/geology/statemap/missouri-maps.htm)

Two dozen years ago, November, 1982

The front page of the November, 1982 edition of Traveler carried a contrast of deer hunting styles.
Charlie Slovensky told of sticking it out in a cold fog, in a tree stand near a cedar thicket. Layers of clothing, covered with wool, patience. vigilance. Charlie took down a spike buck that day.
Contrasting style was offered by Bob Todd, who reasoned if deer spend most of hunting season napping, why shouldn’t a hunter? He went on to describe some memorable naps and how to prepare for an excellent deer hunt nap. Bob was awakened from a nap by the biggest buck he ever killed, a wide-racked eight pointer.
The most generous quail season in memory was opening – Nov. 1 through Jan. 15, with a bag limit of eight. Previously, quail season opened on Nov. 10 beginning in 1915.
Biologists wanted to move the season forward and 1982 seemed a good year to do it – quail seemed to be on a population upswing.
A federal judge ruled in favor of the Ozark National Scenic Riverways, clearing a plan to regulate river use by controlling the number and size of canoe rentals.
Going much, much further back, Emma Comfort Dunn wrote about the second attempt by the French to exploit the rich mineral deposits of this area. That was in 1719. It was the first time lead was smelted in a furnace. Earlier French and Indians simply piled lead ore on the ground and built a huge bonfire around it, which melted perhaps a third of the lead in the ore.
Congressman Bill Emerson who claimed to be on the fence about the Irish Wilderness proposal was found to be lobbying behind the scenes against wilderness designation, favoring drilling for minerals instead.
There was a story on a two-day fall float, hunting and fishing, Bob Todd and son Bo. A doe swam the river and stopped in the shallows to shake like a dog. In light fog, Bob and Bo floated almost close enough to touch the doe before she noticed them.
It was announced the Department of Conservation would construct a boat ramp on the Diversion Channel south of Cape Girardeau.
And the Corps of Engineers at Lake Wappapello closed the day use facilities – including the only public restroom – at Chaonia Landing Sept. 15 to save money. The quarter-million dollar restroom was relatively new and apparently expensive to operate. Meanwhile, a restroom about a mile from lake access at the Dam was kept open to serve a volleyball court.
Traveler was reporting on the moon back then. For opening day, moonrise would be about three hours before sunrise, perhaps giving deer time to feed before season opened.
Bo Todd and Craig Thomas hiked the Ozark Trail through the Blair Creek section and turned in a two-page photo spread.
There was a story about a float on Whitewater Creek in Cape County. Duck hunting was poor, but the spotted bass were extremely aggressive. About 100 fish were boated, of which three were keepers.
Duck hunters were being reminded that any large, white birds might be trumpeter swans and should not be shot. Back then, they migrated here irregularly. Today, they visit Mingo National Wildlife Refuge and surroundings almost every year.
Rose Alexander wrote about playing house as a little girl in the Ozarks when acorns made the cups and saucers that she played with.

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