I tried Purtis Creek

Since Austin was too far for a quick trip I went to Purtis Creek on the recommendation of some of you guys. The wind was brutal and the perch were relentless so it wasn't the best of trips but the grass carp are there.
My bait was being stolen by what I assumed were perch so I put a worm on and guess what.

My wife likes to cast so I sent her walking along the dam with a kastmaster and immediately started getting these pics. She caught several nice ones.


And finally a good bite on a carp rod and I set the hook and broke it off, no idea what happened other than I damaged the line a few days ago when I caught about five commons and didn't retie, my mistake.
A few minutes later my buddy Patrick has a good run and after a surprisingly short fight I netted his 36 pounder.

I've only had experience with this one grass carp but I was disappointed that the fight didn't last longer. There was some surface action but for the size of the fish it was a let down. After that the wind really started and the lake began to white cap so that was about it for bites. I'll be back to try for the grass carp again for sure just to see if they all fight this way and also because I've never caught one.

Great fish. Looks like a nice day at Purtis Creek. I fished there a ton about a decade ago and definitely need to go back soon.

great write up and great snap shots , that tree is where i usually set up , i have found that the when the water warms up later in the year is the best time for grassers and carp . im surprised the fight wast that strong ,must be the cold water still . i taped my bud with a grasser on time we went heres how hard they usually fight ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6y5fsaCer0g

what i have found is that the nice cats bite in the mornings on carp baits then around 2 the grassers take over and bite ,anyway thats my experience there

Oh and cmc we are having a get together at white rock Sunday the 24th of April
, it will be all day so come at your convenience and meet some of the dfw carpers . we will be at 3800 W.Lawther , bring your poles and join us ! most guys will get there at 7 am and fish 12 hours

i caught this one on april 6 at the rock almost 20 weighing in at 19.13 .... oh and the chance of catching a koi is good too

Thanks a lot for the invite sir. Ill sure try to make it. I would love to catch a koi.

Nice pics, thanks for sharing. Your family and friends really produce results.In general grassers are not known for being hard fighters.I reeled in my line once to go home and their was a 5 lb grasser attached to my hook.That's never happened with the hundreds of common carp my son and I have captured.I've only fished once in the last 3 years with my son and we did get a new pb grasser at 47" and 38lbs8 ounces and it was one of the weakest fighters of the day. In fact we thought it was just going to be small 12-13 lb common or slightly larger grass carp.We had much better fights from 20lb grass carp that day.Common carp like the one Jesse is holding in general will give a better fight than grass carp.Grass carp are very different in almost every respect than common carp and smallmouth buffalo.We got a pretty good fight once out of a 36lb grass carp but Ive caught commons and buffalo at that same weight that just tore the line off my reel with multiple long runs. Grass carp can only stay out of the water just long enough to get a quick picture and weight or they may die if they are released. We have released ours successfully but we have heard of them just floating if out of the water to long..You will probably get a better fight out of some of them though and we still enjoy capturing them but in general they were overstocked on lake Austin and have taken over the lake.They may be pretty decent to eat with proper knowledge on how to prepare them and really need to be thinned out in lake Austin but my son is used to catch and release.They used to require grassers on lake Austin be released but the law may have changed.I watched that film of Jesse's and those grassers sometimes don't like to fight until they see you and they run.

Don't know much about carp fishing. Do you keep the grass carp you catch? It would help the overall quality of the lake if you did...those things really go thru the vegetation in a hurry. Nice photos. The white bass will eat the chrome off a small 1/4 ounce or less vibrating bait when they're feeding up on shad. Electro shock surveys show there are still Redbreasted sunfish in the lake and your pictures confirm it

Nice fish. Good times.

What bait was used for purtis? For the carp.

We used a oats and corn mix flavored with mint extract. The perch didn't bother the mint like they did the almond and anise flavored, I'm not sure why.

How many perch did you catch? Those grassers may be tappers on the hook kind of like buffalo or perch but I might be wrong cause I've only caught maybe 25 grassers and 7 of those were on my last trip at lake austin when the population was high.

That 36 pounder actually beats the lake record by 7 pounds nice fish! And I may give that bait a try this weekend.

We caught perch until I was convinced that's what was messing with my bait and they were all that big.

I thought it might be possible you had both perch and grassers playing with the bait. The mouths of the grass carp are more boney than commons and buffalo, maybe making it harder for the hook to set They are very good at even moving a 3 oz lead around without getting hooked, and we get lots of dropback runs. Our baits were being nibbled and moved around all day long and it would take many many bites before we would catch a fish last time at lake austin, but we might have had perch in the area without knowing it. This is very typical of buffalo also .One thing to watch out for is those hard grass lips and mouths slightly dulling your hook point and then playing around with your bait forever without getting hooked.I had to replace hooks very often and check them regularly for sharpness pretty often if I,m getting bites without runs.Wow beyond lake record capture on first try!

Nice fish!