Texas Parks and Wildlife has a great river access program going, and I was going to be in the neighborhood of the San Marcos River Retreat after doing a little work in Austin, so I made sure to bring my light spinning rig with me.



The San Marcos river was blown out pretty bad last year with a severe flood, but is starting to recover. I thought about throwing my waders in the car but decided against it. I wound up wading anyway in an old pair of sneakers with my pants legs rolled up as far as they go. Caught a few bass on a black Roostertail (I've caught more fish in the last year on this lure than almost anything else I've thrown), all of them in the 12" to 14" range, most of them closer to 12". I was there for two hours and caught 5 or 6 bass and 1 tiny sunfish.



Barring any more devastating floods this stretch of the river should start holding some decent sized bass in the next year.

I grew up floating/fishing this river. My parents had a small cabin right on the river just a short distance below the dam in Martindale. Right in the bend in the river at the bottom of the page after the 1979 bridge. We would catch them all day floating down on tubes fishing with a clear Tiny Torpedo(topwater spinner) or a chartreuse curly-tailed grub on a jighead. Beautiful river/lots of memories!

The Tiny Torpedo sure has caught its share of fish! I first used that lure over 40 years ago. One of my uncles had a cabin on Toledo Bend and a little jon boat, he taught me a lot about bass fishing, and the first lesson was how to fish using a Tiny Torpedo.

I'm wondering if the fish in the picture is a Guadalupe Bass?

Yup, Guad