Watcher Wednesday Hurricane Blues and White Bass Hot Spot
LIVE TRACK HURRICANE IRMA
Welcome to the “Watcher Wednesday” column. This is a day set aside to just watch something you may never have seen before, and enjoy the view from the top of your working hump-day. Me, and my crack research team comprised if myself and I, scour the video world to find something that might be of interest to the demographic that appears to enjoy this website – something that won’t get you too excited, or put you to sleep either. It’s an amazingly hard job! It is difficult to talk fly fishing right now, as the destruction of our beloved Texas Gulf Coast is still fresh and the flotsam still to be gathered into those huge dozer piles, but I did wet a line, and caught some big fat sand bass yesterday. That information is for my subscribers below. Perhaps catching a few will help us get our heads screwed back on straight after the emotional wreck of Harvey? I hope it is your remedy.
HOT SPOT NOW
I was driving along the 455 bridge over the Lake Ray Roberts Dam, and saw the water seemed a bit higher at the bend. Sure enough, they were releasing water and the release was hitting the signal fence on the west side riprap. The “signal fence” is my visual indicator that when a water release hits the lowest section of that fence, and it is submerged; that is the flow where you can start fishing for sand bass and (maybe?) hybrids on that continuation of the Trinity River Elm Fork.
I happened to have a few rods with me, and the north wind was ripping whitecaps off the waves on the lake, so I abandoned my panfishing idea, and dropped down the backside of the dam to be on the lee from the wind.
It smelled like the dam had just been opened up. The decaying matter of the lake had that turnover-like stink. Second cast from the east side up against the concrete, I caught a massive sand bass, but in the rest of the hour there I caught only two more (also massive). Based on the physical condition of these fish, I would say they are hot, tired and looked beat down. If that water is still going today and tomorrow, conditions should improve. There was none of the huge schools of shad either. If those start to get pulled into the river? You can turn the switch to full-on.
So that’s the HOT SPOT. Enjoy! Let me know how it goes for you, and don’t be afraid to bring conventional gear if you’re hungry for a few fish tacos. Heck, if you catch a mess, bring them on over and we can grill ‘em on the Fly Bar!
Category: Body-Mind-Soul, Culture on the Skids, Fishing Reports, Hot Spot, Life Observed, On The Water, Paid Reading Content
