Places To Go

Trail Guide

Pickle Springs CA

• Trails: Tywappity Trail, 2.5 miles
• Unique features: Recreational variety
• Contact by phone: 573-290-5730
• Detailed information: visit our online atlas, keyword "Pickle".
  

Karl von Kessel, fishing editor for The Chaffee Signal, decided in 1955 that Scott County needed a lake. Area residents raised money to buy land along Hindman Creek east of Chaffee. The Conservation Department dammed the creek, creating the 37-acre lake. Today, Tywappity Lake and the surrounding 79 wooded acres offer a variety of recreational opportunities, from hiking along the 2.5-mile Tywappity Trail to camping, nature photography and birdwatching. The lake offers good fishing for bass, sunfish, crappie and catfish. Facilities include a pavilion, picnic tables, cooking grills, a boat ramp and a wheelchair-accessible covered fishing dock with a fish-cleaning station. The area seems to have gotten its name from Spanish explorers, who called the fertile area now encompassed by Tywappity Township “Zewpeta.” The meaning of the name—possibly Indian in origin—is shrouded in mystery. To find Tywappity Community Lake, take Route A east from Chaffee and turn left on Route RA.

Little Piney Creek

Fun with trout and smallmouths.

Can’t decide whether to fish for trout or smallmouth bass? Go after both on Little Piney Creek in the Mark Twain National Forest southwest of Rolla. This stream is a Blue-Ribbon Trout Area from the Dent County line downstream to Milldam Hollow Access. There it turns into a White-Ribbon Trout Area that extends to County Road 7360. The lower stretch is stocked with rainbow trout in the spring and fall. The Blue-Ribbon stretch has only wild rainbow trout. Smallmouth fishing is best in the three miles upstream from the Gasconade River. The White-Ribbon stretch has some smallmouths and lots of goggle-eye. You need a fishing permit and a trout permit to harvest trout. For more information, explore the links listed below or call (573) 368-2225. Be aware that some frontage along Little Piney Creek is privately owned, and respect the owners’ property by staying off posted land.

Wildcat Glades Offerings

Missouri’s newest nature center’s program offerings.

Wildcat Glades Conservation & Audubon Center in Joplin’s Wildcat Park is open and offering programs. Come see a 1,300-gallon aquarium and an Ozark stream with rainbow darters, stonerollers, goggle-eye and gar. See live collared lizards, tarantulas, snakes and other glade animals and visit outdoor learning stations along three miles of trail. You can take a canoe float Nov. 6, join the Chert Glades Naturalists class Feb. 5 or participate in field trips focusing on winter ecology, fly-fishing or the short-eared owl. For more information, call (417) 629-3423 or e-mail Kevin.Badgley@mdc.mo.gov.