Yeah, if you can net a mystery fish and get a picture that would be great.

Just be careful with any potential legal issues involved with netting fish. I doubt it will turn out to be any game fish lol, but just in case.

They probably aren't real "Grass carp" or there wouldn't be any vegetation left, unless they'd only just been introduced.

Grass Carp, which are actually White Amur and not at all related to our beloved Common Carp, are the fish they often give carp a bad name. They're usually strict vegetarians and can devastate a water bodie's vegetation if they are not kept in check. They're not legal to have in posession without a permit, though they could have washed down from somewhere.

If they are really tall bodied, from top to bottom, then they could be buffalo. ( In the sucker family like I said. )

I still think they may be a mix of species, maybe if you can net one, and get a good picture, you can get a few more too! I wanna see this things and solve this mystery!

Whatever they are, I definitely think someone needs to do some serious carping at those spots, there are probably a few serious bruisers in there.

Starless Im with you I like to fish for what ever is in the water. I have never fished for carp, and would love to go out with someone who knew what they were doing. Carpin we need to hook up, I am behind the DQ in Schertz, E-mail me.

I'd love to head out there and fish with you sometime Mikey! I think Comal is a bit out of my range right now, but maybe if some of the other guys in my area head down there, I could go with them.

If Carpin' is in your area you two should definitely hook up, and he can show you the ropes! Make sure to bring a camera though! hehe.

Starless, those white grass carp you described to me, I have seen those up to 2 and half feet long. Come on down you have a free place to crash.

If I catch one, do I get a T-shirt from the carp brigade?

Really? Interesting. I wonder how they got into the river. If they are sterile, and there aren't too many of them they won't be a problem. They are often stocked into private ponds and lakes in order to control vegetation. Some ponds and lakes do just fine as long as there aren't too many of them. Those that are stocked are supposed to be sterile. I guess the ones you've seen must have washed down there somehow.

If you want to try and catch them, I've heard the best way is to get them used to taking food of the surface, say, bread or chunks of bagel. Once they are taking it, put a hook in the next peice you throw out, and wait for a fish to surface and suck it in, let him start swimming off, then set the hook! LSC has caught them and says they sometimes jump several feel into the air, just like tarpon. They can also strip off a lot of drag, though I've heard that some of them get confused, and just let you reel them in, then go crazy near the bank or in the net.

They're quite different from the carp we normally pursue though. But still cool. Hopefully they won't harm the area at all.

And yes, if you catch a carp, you get a carp brigade T-shirt lol. Or if you catch a buffalo.

Keep in mind though, that White Amur ( Grass Carp ) aren't real carp. We try to make that distinction whenever we can, because a lot of people get them confused, and many of the bad things people attribute incorrectly to common carp are actually grass carp. Commons do NOT eat vegetation for example.

Also, as far as the T-shirt, Zack made a thread recently asking who wanted one of the new ones. He has some of the originals left over too, so feel free to find that thread, and request one for yourself, give him your size.

Here's some illustrations from TPWD website:

Common Carp:



White Amur (Grass Carp):


Smallmouth Buffalo:



Of special note: Carp, that is, true Common Carp, our prized sportfish, have barbels at the sides of their mouth. They have four of them, two larger, easily noticed barbels and two smaller barbels.

The other fish often confused with carp do not have barbels. That is one of the best ways to tell the species apart.

Also, the eye on smallmouth buffalo in real life often looks very big, and very black.

Starless that last pic, the smallmouth buff that looks alot like what I am looking at. We caught 21 lmb today, most were small but fun.

The pictures you sent weren't clear enough to determine key features. I did notice that they looked different than buffalo in body length x girth. The head an mouth area seem to be similiar to a grass carp.
I've caught some similar-shaped but much darker buffalo/sucker type fish below Texoma spillway. The swim water shallower than they're height often at night. It's very likely that these fish are related to other suckers, but have been in a different environment for a long time. Good luck with the fish!

21 Largemouth? Nice catch!

It's possible you're seeing SM Buffalo, though most of the fish in the pictures you sent didn't look tall enough. From their Dorsal fin to their bellies, buffalo are usually real tall. Though the ones you're seeing could be young fish, or maybe it's just the way the pictures came out. There could also be a mix of species as I've been saying.

FirstName - See what I mean? They look longer and thinner then carp/buffalo, but at least one of them looked as though it might have had a sucker mouth, which GC don't have. So I still think some of them may be some species of sucker. ( Non buffalo I mean. )

Still hoping you can catch or net some Mikey so we can figure it out. If you do, get a good picture of the fish's body, as well as one of the head and mouth.

Well yhere are signs all over, do not disturb natural habitat, no wadeing or swimming. Thereare protected species there. So a cast net probably would not be good, and they wont touch anything. I have some more pics from today, but I dont know if they are any better than the others. I will load them up and send them to you anyway.

FYI, I once caught a river buff and it was long and slender like a carp. Caught it in OK below the lake Tenkiller dam on the Lower Illinois River on a rooster tail. It probably weighed 5 or 6 lbs but it looked nothing like the buff we catch in the Vine.

Starless, I've heard you talk about how river carp have a different body shape than lake carp just because of the current in the river. This applies to buffs as well in my experience.

That's a very good point Donnie. Buffalo in Rivers are often not as tall bodied and broad as those in lakes, same with carp. That's not always true, but it's a fairly accurate generalization for both species I think.

Some of the fish you're seeing, especially some of the larger fish, could definitely be buffalo that are a little more streamlined then those we're used to catching in lakes.

As far as long and slender fish, when I'm talking about Suckers as long and slender, I'm not talking about long and slender like a carp, I'm talking about long and slender the same way a trout is long and slender.

Some of the fish in the pictures I was sent look to have this body shape:



That's a White Sucker, with the typical sucker body shape. ( Not my photo, found it off Google. ) Notice the mouth. Most suckers mouths will do a full "bottom oriented extension" just like a smallmouth buffalo.

The buffalo we are acustom to in the lakes have looked very similar, if not broader at times in the river when I've caught them. I've caught a handful or more of different suckers. In Oklahoma, by Turner Falls, there is a type of sucker I've seen which is speckled and the size of a bluegill, if memory serves me well. They are long and lean and look similar to fish I've seen in an aquarium.
I am willing to bet that the vast majority of us don't even know half of the sucker-type fish in Texas. Please post pics if you get ahold of one!
And thanks for sharing.