All of life, all of creation, exists as rhythm. Energy pulsing, spiraling, flowing in waves as we dance through life. To find the rhythm and discover the beat is to be in harmony with nature, to catch the wave and ride it through. To miss the rhythm, to be in dissonance, the wave may crash you against the shore. As a drummer, you become aware of the the natural rhythms around, the cicada song, the beat of the weather as the cold fronts come through in sets, the waves crashing against the boat, and the patterns of the fish. The natural rhythms are constantly changing and evolving, one must be in awareness of the current patterns to jump into the rhythm and feel where you are supposed to be, to be in harmony with nature. To feel what the fish are doing, to be in sync with their ever changing rhythms is what makes a good fisherman.

This year, the fish are dancing to a different beat and it has been challenging to keep up. Due to the cold winter shad kill here on Lake Texoma and surrounding lakes, the striper behave differently. Having the large schools of bait fish in the water play a huge part in the striper patterns, concentrating the fish and working them up into a feeding frenzy. Without the bait fish, the striper are more scattered out and each day seems to be different as the fish are also learning to cope with finding a different food source. This makes it difficult to lure fish and live bait has been the way to go. Even though it has been a little more inconsistent than usual, we have still had some great fishing this year and we always take home fish. Most of the spring we have been fishing with shiners and black salties to substitute of our lack of threadfin shad. Here recently this years hatch of gizzard shad, which were not affected by the cold winter, have become big enough to use for bait which has made it easier to catch fish.

Today with the cold front blowing through, the fish turned on. I took out one of my high school football coaches, Coach Davis, out just me and him and we had a great time. It started out a little slow but I got a call from my friend Mark who finally got on some fish and we went and threw him a rope. It was a frenzy from then on catching overs till we were tired of catching them. We were alternating two rods and we couldn't even get one rod to the bottom before we had a fish on. We were fishing on anchor using live gizzard shad in 55ft of water going 5 cranks off the bottom. We were only able to keep 5 fish because they were all over 20� but that's always a good problem to have.



This year to stay on the fish you just have to keep moving and keep the faith. Knowing that even though it may be slow, the fish can turn on anytime. Many of my trips have gone the whole morning without much happening to have the fish really turn on during the last hour we are out. The question hasn't been what is the best day to come, but what is the best hour to be on the water. The fish have their own schedule and don't seem to be giving it out to anyone, but finding that rhythm is what makes fishing so much fun.



The weather is going to be nice and cool for the next few days and at least as of today the fishing is good. If you get the itch to catch come fish, give me a call and we will see if we can't get into sync with the fish rhythm. I practice the gift economy meaning I have no set rates. We go fishing as friends and after the trip you are free to give in return whatever you feel the trip is worth to you. You can book your trip online at www.stripersinc.com or give me a call anytime at (903)815-1609 and I'll get you set up. For live, on the water reports, like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/stripersinc

Your Lake Texoma Striper Fishing Guide,
Brian Prichard
Stripers Inc.
www.stripersinc.com
(903)815-1609

Very nice post and interesting philosophy. Best of luck and keep getting em!

Made me wanna go out and hug a striper instead of a tree!

Awesome post. Thanks for sharing.

+2

Thanks Brian