All Interested In Florida's Native Riverine Striped Bass...

[Ocklawahaman]

To all RiverBassin readers interested in Florida's native riverine STRIPED BASS...

Check-out my Florida STRIPER articles and postings at

http://www.riverbassin.com/site/stri...re-rodman-dam/

http://www.riverbassin.com/site/our-...dam-spillways/

http://riverbassin.com/forum/showthr...nd-In-The-Past!

Sincerely,

[Dirk]

I enjoyed those reads. Too bad there are not more springs/thermal refuges still available to them so they could reach trophy sizes.Thanks for posting the links.

[Ocklawahaman]

It is a real shame that the historical natural striped bass fishing of Marion County, Florida's Ocklawaha River continues to be sacrificed to keep Rodman Reservoir in place! Endemic, native striped bass in the 30-pound class and largemouth bass up to 21 pounds have been reported from the free-flowing Ocklawaha River of Marion County in the past--with NO assist from Rodman Dam and many miles upriver of any part of Rodman Reservoir. The damming of the Ocklawaha on 9/30/1968 to create Rodman Reservoir (Eureka to Rodman Dam) has only produced one reported 17-pound 2-ounce largemouth bass (its largest ever) from that 13,000 acre man-made "backwater" in all the years since.

Much ado is made over the designation of Rodman Reservoir by our FWC as one of the TEN best largemouth bass fishing lakes in Florida!

"Ocklawahaman" would respond by pointing out that prior to the completion of Rodman Dam in 1968, the Ocklawaha River would have been listed as one of the TOP FIVE best largemouth bass fishing flowing rivers (25 miles or longer fishable length) in Florida! The top 5 largemouth bass fishing rivers (25 miles or longer fishable length) in Florida BACK THEN would probably have been: 1.) St. Johns River, 2.) Ocklawaha River, 3.) Withlacoochee River, 4.) Suwannee River, and 5.) Apalachicola River. And only the St. Johns, Ocklawaha, and Apalachicola rivers contained endemic naturally reproducing stocks of striped bass (some of them in the 30-pound class).

If we expanded the list of Florida’s best largemouth bass fishing flowing rivers (25 miles or longer fishable length) BACK THEN to TEN then it would maybe include: Kissimmee River (before channelization), Hillsborough River, Peace River, Ochlockonee River, or possibly another-- add one other or take one away. Those several large alluvial rivers of our Panhandle such as the Escambia, Yellow, Choctawhatchee, etc are usually not known for their largemouth bass fishing. The other famous Florida artesian spring runs (providing good largemouth bass action) that empty into the Gulf or the St. Johns River do not have 25 miles of fishable stream.

Peninsular Florida is blessed with thousands of lakes but very few swift-flowing streams of any length. The pre-Rodman Dam strong-flowing 56-mile long Silver River/Ocklawaha River was unique in this state by virtue of having a 1st Magnitude artesian spring group headwater, with unimpeded access for fish and other aquatic life, located more than 50 miles above tidewater.