The concrete low-water bridge on Crooked Creek known as Kelly’s Slab is coming down.

The slab bridge is hurting smallmouth bass, the very fish that brings anglers to Crooked Creek.

The Arkansas Game & Fish Commission plans to remove a big chunk of the bridge to allow Crooked Creek to flow the way nature intended to boost smallmouth habitat.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act awarded a $250,000 contract to Game & Fish to build a new higher bridge upstreamfrom Kelly’s Slab and to convert parts of the remaining slab to handicapped accessible fishing. An eroding stream bank will also be repaired.

The new upstream bridge will make it safer and more reliable for school buses to take students to the Fred Berry education center on the west side of the bridge.

Steve Filipek, assistant chief of fisheries at Game & Fish, said Crooked Creek is one of the nation’s top smallmouth bass streams.

“The problem with lowwater bridges like this is that it is basically a dam with a few pipes through it,” he said.

Outdoor, Pages 9 on 11/05/2009

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