Montauk: a siren, a $5 tag and three zones
The Current starts inside Montauk State Park, where springs and little Pigeon Creek put more than 40 million gallons a day into the channel beside the 1896 gristmill, and MDC's Montauk Fish Hatchery sits right on the water. From March 1 through October 31 you need a fishing permit plus a daily trout tag, $5 for adults and $3 for kids 15 and under, sold by the park concessionaire. The limit is four trout of both species combined, and you must quit once you hold eight. One pole per person; no gigging, snagging or taking live bait. Hours shift by month, from 7:00 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. in April to 7:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. in October.
The park is split into a catch-and-release flies-only zone, a fly-fishing-only zone, and a zone where artificial lures and natural bait are both legal, so check the signs before you rig. Winter catch-and-release runs November 13, 2026 through February 8, 2027, Friday through Monday only, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., flies only, and during that season an annual trout permit replaces the daily tag.
The cable to Cedargrove: nine miles of 18-inch water
Walk down from the lower campground loop to the cable at the park boundary and you are in the Blue Ribbon Trout Area, which MDC runs 9 miles to the Cedargrove low-water bridge on Dent County Road 6510. Other writers call it six or eight miles; the river mile log puts Cedargrove at mile 9.0, so trust MDC. The rules: one trout a day, 18 inches minimum for browns and rainbows alike, flies and artificial lures only, no soft plastics and no scented or natural baits. Felt and other porous soles are illegal in Dent, Texas and Shannon counties.
This is brown trout water. MDC stocks browns every year, 14 inches at stocking in 2023, and estimates about 300 browns per mile between Tan Vat and Baptist. In the 2025 sample more than two thirds of the fish were over 15 inches and more than a third cleared 18. Rainbows here are park escapees, mostly 10 to 15 inches. Access is the park, Tan Vat at mile 0.9, Baptist Camp at 2.1 and Cedargrove; Tan Vat to Baptist is wade-only water, and Missouri Trout Hunter warns some stretches below are too deep to wade with banks you cannot walk. A new strain of brown was stocked late in 2024 after the November flood knocked out the Akers gauge at 23.23 feet.
Below the low-water bridge, four fish and a bait rod
From the Cedargrove bridge the White Ribbon Trout Area runs 7.7 miles to Akers Ferry Access. The daily limit is four, rainbows have no minimum, browns must be 15 inches, and any legal bait is allowed. MDC stocks 10 to 12 inch rainbows about once a month all year, but in July, August and low water it holds stockings to the cooler, bigger stretch between Welch Spring and Akers, because Welch pumps in 78.2 million gallons a day at about mile 13.7 below Montauk. There are only three landings on this reach: Cedargrove, Welch and Akers. Much of it is too deep to wade, so a canoe is the practical way to fish it; the NPS puts Cedargrove to Akers at about three hours of paddling.
A Missouri trout permit is required to keep trout anywhere outside the park. Hog suckers are limited to five a day from Cedargrove to the Arkansas line, and walleye must be 18 inches on the whole river.
What the Akers number means
Gauge 07064533 sits just above Akers, at the foot of the trout water, so it reads everything Montauk, Welch Spring and Big Creek contribute. Its USGS monthly means run from about 244 cfs in October to 867 in May. In the two weeks before September 24, 2026 it ran 143 to 180 cfs, well under the September mean of 264, with one rain bump on the 22nd. No shop publishes a wading range for this gauge, so the 150 to 900 cfs band here is built from that record: the bottom is that late-summer low, when wading the Blue Ribbon is easy but canoes drag in spots above Welch Spring, and the top is roughly where a Missouri Scenic Rivers contributor pegs the old 2-foot float ceiling, about 900 cfs. The same writer ties the 4-foot flood stage, where the NPS closes the upper river, to just under 3,000 cfs.
Ignore the older foot readings you find online. The Akers gauge was rebuilt after the November 2024 flood and now reads about 0.7 feet at 150 cfs, so quote cfs, not feet.
Pulltite, Two Rivers and the bass river
Below Akers the Ozark National Scenic Riverways, created by Congress on August 27, 1964, carries the river past Pulltite at NPS river mile 82, Round Spring at 71 and Two Rivers at 54, where the Jacks Fork comes in. Carr's Canoe Rental runs Akers Ferry to Pulltite as a 10-mile, four to six hour float and Pulltite to Round Spring as nine miles. Chain pickerel are common between Akers and Two Rivers. MDC's 2023 sample near Powder Mill found the most smallmouth between 8 and 12 inches and about a quarter over 12. Jetboats become common below Two Rivers, and Big Spring near Van Buren adds an average 286 million gallons a day.
Do not bring Jacks Fork rules onto the main stem. The Current itself has no smallmouth special area: black bass are six a day with a 12-inch minimum, and from March 1 until the harvest opener on May 23, 2026 every bass goes back. Goggle-eye carry a 7-inch minimum on the whole river. MDC's own advice is rocky riffles in spring, deep bluff holes in summer, and rootwads in moderate current in fall.
Flies that match the calendar
Big Y Fly Co's Current River chart runs BWO from March through September and caddis from mid-April through September; Family-Outdoors says both show up in any month and calls PMDs best in May and June and Tricos a July through September morning event, sizes 20 to 28. Hoppers work from July into early October. When nothing is hatching, locals lean on egg patterns, size 14 to 18 Hare's Ears, scuds, zebra midges in 22, and crayfish or sculpin streamers for the Blue Ribbon browns.