An Unexpected Day on the Meramec River

A forgotten bass lure turns a four-mile kayak trip into a string of surprising catches

By Chris Catiller

If you fish long enough, you’ll find it’s a funny, unpredictable sport. One minute, you have no idea what you’re doing. Soon, you start catching fish, and you think you’ve got it figured out. That’s when, suddenly, you couldn't buy a fish to look at your lure, and you start to question why you’re wasting your time and money on such a hobby. Other times, you catch or see something so bizarre it completely reshapes your view of reality. The latter is what happened to me on my most recent trip on the Meramec River.

My plan was to shoot a bass fishing video for my YouTube channel from my kayak through a four-mile stretch of the lower river using a Mepps Comet Mino. It’s a lure I haven’t used since I was a teenager. I remember it being a good bass lure, but I haven't given it much thought since other lures pushed it to the recesses of my mind. So, when my dad gave me a birthday wishlist that contained the Comet Mino (it’s one of his all-time favorites), I figured I’d grab a couple for my own tackle box. Those lures had been sitting in my spinner box since December collecting dust. Finally, on this scorching hot, late-August afternoon, I heard the tiny Mino voices call out from their box and convince me to tie one onto my line. What happened over the next four miles of river is something I wouldn’t have put money on.

What I was targeting were primarily largemouth, spotted, and white bass. The Meramec has good populations of those species. However, what it has great populations of are gar, and it didn’t take long for me to get a harsh reminder. Within five casts, I hooked into two gar. One was a little longnose that I lost as I was trying to net it, and the second was a big one I didn’t even have a chance to lay eyes on. It was massive and must’ve gotten the lure and line all in its mouth because, after I set the hook, my 10-pound monofilament snapped. The horrible realization occurred to me that I was down to my final Mino. Lose this one, and my video plans for my viewers would be shot to pieces. The gar kept the pressure on from beginning to end. I managed to land a good-sized, 35-inch longnose, but gar activity wasn’t the unexpected part of this trip.

The first surprise came with the first catch of the day in the form of an eater-size channel catfish. I caught it just inside a creek mouth where I’ve had success before with bass, walleye, and sauger. While not my preferred method of catfishing, it’s always a pleasant surprise reeling in one of my whiskered friends aggressive enough to hit a fast-moving lure. Still, it wasn’t the bass I was after, and that particular spot was overrun with carp. Thankfully, there were numerous other spots like downed trees, rock piles, and eddies left to hit. That’s where the next several surprises took the bait.

Only a few minutes after leaving the creek mouth, the next non-bass eye-opener hit in a large eddy. It gave me quite the ride getting it onto the kayak, making the subsequent picture well worth the effort. Fifteen minutes after that, I hooked into the same species of fish, roughly the same size as the previous catch. Not too long after releasing the second fish, I caught another one. Albeit this one was much smaller than the previous two, this series of catches was becoming a trend. Things got really quiet for the next mile or so, and with the sun quickly sinking below the horizon, I knew I was running out of time and river.

That’s when it happened. Less than half a mile from my take-out point, something big crushed the Mino. I was praying for it to be a bass because, if it was, it would undoubtedly be a personal best. As it turned out, it was a new personal best, but it wasn’t a bass. It was the same species as the previous catches, only much bigger. These four catches weren’t something I expected to hook this many times using bass lures. I’d seen it done before, but the one or two times I’ve witnessed it, I thought it was more of a fluke than an indication of something that could be repeated. The surprise species I did not expect to see this consistently was the freshwater drum.

I’ve always thought the freshwater drum to be the derpiest-looking native goofball swimming in our waterways. However, I have to admit they are a lot of fun on medium-sized tackle (and a tasty meal out of the frying pan), especially if you hook into a big one. It took me a while to get that last big drum onto my kayak, and it was a great way to cap off the trip. Unfortunately, the Comet Mino didn’t get me the bass I was looking for, but it opened new possibilities in my mind about what the fish living in the Meramec are capable of doing. Does this mean I find drum more fun to catch than bass? No. I’ll take a smallmouth, largemouth, white, or striper over a drum any day of the week. However, now that I know what drum can do, they will make an excellent consolation prize.