I recently published a book titled, "The Art of Fishing for Records" and I am interested in how many of the anglers on this forum are familiar with the Texas Parks and Wildlife Freshwater Elite Angler Program. I basically have 2 questions:

1. Have you heard of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Freshwater Elite Angler Program?

2. If you are a Texas Parks and Wildlife Freshwater Elite angler and how long did it take you to acquire all five big fish awards to get your Elite Angler Certificate?

It is a great program is you are not familiar with it and you should give it a try.

Yes I'm familiar with it. My dad and I are challenging ourselves to get all 5 within the year. We've already got two down a piece!

Yes I've heard of it and also have been a fresh water elite angler for about 5 years, took me a couple of years. I helped a lady and she managed to get the award in about a year.

Thanks for the reply. Good luck on completing it. The freshwater is much harder to get than the saltwater.

Congratulations on your elite angler award. A year is very fast for a freshwater elite angler. Thanks for the reply.

I was the second person to earn an Elite Angler Award, the first one to get it for freshwater and the first one to get it for fly fishing. It took me just about a year to earn it.

Thanks for the reply Fish Chaser. That is a great accomplishment.

It all boils down to time spent on the water, and a lot of luck being at the right place at the right time.

I agree with time on the water. You also need some knowledge to catch different species of fish. My wife was the first women angler to achieve both the Elite Freshwater and Elite Saltwater Angler awards and it took her 3 years to get both.

Took me about 3 months for the freshwater. No guides, 3 on fly if memory serves me correctly and all were catch and release. Thank you to the folks that were kind enough to vouch as witnesses.

Wow Lusca that is smoking fast for an elite angler award. And half on a fly rod is even more impressive.

I just got an email from TPWD. They are having computer issues with their awards programs so they have not posted new records, including the elite angler awards, this month. The last posting was 5 April and they are not going to post again until the first week in June.

It took me 6 months to get my freshwater elite angler award. I've actually caught 10 recognized big fish award species. All on the fly. Plus a state catch and release record 11 inch hybrid sunfish, not a recognized big fish award species, also on the fly.

6 months is really fast and doing it on a fly is great.