There was one of those lakes outside of my old home town that was awsome, the best fishing period. They had a cattle guard and when you crossed it they had a mail box you put in $5.00 per day. A few years later someone else bought the land and put up a gate and stopped the fishing. There was a lawsuit over it because even tho that was private land, the lake was built with tax payer money and i understood that they could not refuse access to it as long as you didn't leave trash or cause any damage. I moved away from there several years ago and there are several of those lakes around me now and they are all posted.

Yea. I can't imagine buying a multi million dollar piece of property with a soil conversation lake on it and having to allow people I did not invite access to my ranch. Who would ever buy one, if you had to allow folks access? Parties, trash, all hours of the night, no control...no thanks.

Soil Conservation lakes on private property can not be fished without permission from landowner. The exception is if there is a deeded recorded easement allowing public access.

Our Tax dollars are still being poured into these conservation lakes.
Go to : www.tsswcb.texas.gov to the left of the page click on Flood Control Programs

TSSWCB Awards Flood Control Grant to Local Soil and Water Conservation District
TEMPLE - TSSWCB awards funding to the Navarro SWCD to match federal dollars from the USDA-NRCS Emergency Watershed Protection (EWP) Program for needed repairs to flood control dams.
Read more...

I'm writing a letter to my state rep and encourage others to do the same. I have called gov agencies also and got the run around. Sure lawyers were involved, because most ranchers got these lakes for free and don't want anyone to use them. I have a friend who has a friend that has one of these lakes on his ranch and tpwd has stocked it and runs the shock boat on it ever couple of years, and yes it is posted and yes it is a high fence ranch and yes that is illegal, but know one wants to do anything about it.

A friend of a friend huh?

I have one on my place for erosion/flood control. The Feds selected properties with wildlife management goals in mind. In other words, I had to have previously met a lot of different criteria and several guys that I know applied but were not selected. It's about an acre or a little more and was cost sharing with the USDA. They checked on it for 6 or 7 years and then it's all mine. I believe that they spend/spent a maximum $19,000 and I covered the rest. To my knowledge, the program is no longer active.

They don't stock them. That's the landowners problem. Nor does the USDA or the TPWD come by to run shock boats. If the allegations are true from the friend of a friend there would have to be political connections involved.

And, trespassing is still trespassing. Poaching is still poaching.

Well these tanks were usually built to assist in some flood control. The owners of the property get the tank sometimes for free and sometimes for a small cost. But they have to maintain certain aspects of the dam such as no beavers, overgrowth, reasonable access to dam by guvment for inspections, etc at their own expense. So it ain't free by no means to a landowner. I have a friend who owned property that had a 23 acre tank on it for flood control and it was a pain in the derrier to deal with the guvment and their requirements.

So if a landowner would be required to allow public fishin on said tank, I would see absolutely no problem in charging an access fee to cross the private land to reach a "public tank". It it were my property and I had to let someone fish a tank on my property, then I would hire a "land janitor" to keep up with all the trash, road maintenance, fish stocking if it became necessary, etc and the access fee would cover all them added expenses. Basically you could access if ya really wanted to but it would be Kinda expensive.

I helped that friend of mine do some excavation work on that ranch about 8 years ago and there was a TPWD shock boat out on that aprox 25 acre lake and i saw them dipnetting some fish. I was told they have been managing the bass. I'm sure there were some political deals going on, but several years ago (30yrs)i fished several of those lakes around the southern Dallas area and TPWD did stock those according to the land owners. The bottom line is if any Taxpayers money was spent on it weather it is private or not the public is entitled to some use of it weather it be free access or charge a respectable gate fee. I live on Cedar Creek Lake and it belongs to Tarrent County Water District, they bought the land, built the lake, but they got some grant money(tax money) and thats why its a public lake. Thats the reason most lakes are public because a portion of tax money was used to build it or purchase the land. There is still tax money available for repairs to existing lakes its called O&M Grant program.

Yep, at one time, long ago, the State did supply fish for getting a private pond started. Then they quit. I've always wondered whether private fish sellers kicked up a fuss about competition.

The $19,000 is pretty small compared to the real costs of having a water hole. And fish stocking is the least expensive part of the process that a lot of people try to save money on. Maintaining a decent fishing hole is a lot of work and $. Initial stocking, done right, is less than $500 per acre.

I remember a story several years ago about a State Senator who got his land stocked by TPWD with some exotic "deer". I expect that is about what you saw when TPWD sent in the shock boats. An awful lot of landowners these days don't go for the standard recommendation of bass, bluegills and catfish.

BTW, I'm aware of one private lake that was done for flood control. The Land owner didn't want it. The Feds keep a careful eye on it but could care less about the fish.

You're not speaking of Hi-View are you? In Midlothian? Off of 875?

What was the response from your state rep? Did you hear from many others who also wrote?

1. The state is not doing shock surveys on these lakes. You may "have a friend who has a friend that has one of these lakes," but my family owns one, and the state has never shocked it. With thousands of soil conservation lakes in the State, it would literally be impossible for the state to survey them "every couple of years" like you say.

2. The state did not purchase the land from the landowner, they simply build the lake, so the public has no claim to it.

3. The lakes were built to control flooding and soil erosion (which is a benefit to the public), fishing is just a byproduct of the lake existing. Your tax dollars were spent to help with flooding/erosion, not to provide a lake to fish in. If the state built a retaining wall or culvert on private land, would you be demanding access to it? Just because the project happened to be a lake and you like to fish does not give you the right to access private property.

^^^This^^^. Excellent post Techsan4!

Exactly, and the fish in the lakes are the property of the landowner, not the state. [color:#3333FF][/color]

PM SENT

When they construct on that pond they will drain it and if the water and fish all go in a field and die they do not care.