I recently attended a meeting of the Missouri Smallmouth Alliance's blue ribbon advisory panel. The Alliance is a group of smallmouth anglers who believe the Missouri Department of Conservation could manage the state's smallmouth bass better and that Missouri has the potential to become the premier smallmouth state in the nation. The blue ribbon committee is working on management options it will present to the MDC.

Let me review quickly the history of our current smallmouth management program. Missouri is blessed with some of the nation's best smallmouth bass streams. Management regulations by the MDC beginning in the late 1960s set this in motion. The first was a 12- inch length limit. Research on the Huzzah and Courtois rivers showed that limit maintained healthy smallmouth bass populations and improved fishing. But with time and heavier fishing, fishing quality declined.