Posted by meathauler.

I've kept a few. But mostly CPR these days.


I still maintain, it's just not significant given the sheer numbers of fish in the lake. Even if 1,000 fish were being kept every day of the spring run (it's not even close to that), it wouldn't make the impact seen in the gillnet surveys.

Lake Travis had a 12" minimum limit for a time, but they rolled it back because biologists determined it was environmental factors, not fishing pressure, that are the main controls of white bass populations.

Like I mentioned there are many possible reasons. I'll see what the State responds with. No matter what the cause. We are seeing the effects. I've fished the lake too long to not know otherwise. Ask some of the guides. They know. They are out there a lot. All most of us want is a stable fishery. I keep seeing mention of the numbers of fish. That is the entire reason for the survey. And the surveys clearly show a decline in the numbers. That's all I'm saying. It could be a myriad of explanations. But the numbers are real. Stay tuned.

Michael, I wish Ray Hubbard was set up like Tawakoni. I love your U-tube videos.

It seems like it would need to be a wide scale issue to make that big of a difference that quickly. There has been a lot of water that passed through the lake over the last couple of years given the rainfall totals. Could that have been a MAJOR reason for the decline in numbers?

I would like to see the limit numbers managed. How much fish can you really eat? (Except for the Guides, I would not want to impact their livelihood.)

Also, maybe they could somehow protect the spawn.

JLight those are two things that several people have mentioned to me outside of the Forum. The floods and the management aspect. I hope to find out more soon. Thanks.

Agree, fish gets flush once the dam is opened, just like how texoma was a couple of years ago huge impact on all lakes. It's not the fishing, it's the dams

Good open discussion post, Frank. Thanks. The numbers are definitely down and no one truly knows why. Even the experts, our lake biologists.

I bank fish and fished Rowlett Creek for many years before owning a boat 14 years ago so I comprehend, agree, and sympathize with what Dipson said. Bank fishing is tough and not as easy as many are believing, even during the sandbass run. And most days you can throw the heavy cast net until you are blue and you don't catch that many baits. There are a few bad apples in bank or boat fishing, so throw them all in the same bucket seems offensive both ways. What I've experienced is that bankers I know and met they do network like boaters to help catch fish and to protect and report illegal activities. We are all more alike than we know.

RHSA guys been chatting in our text group about the low fish counts. The best educated guess so far is the dam gates open theory by Michael. Lavon and Hubbard have been relatively high since the great flood of 2015. BOTH lakes have gates opened for long periods and that may have "flushed" many down stream.

A positive sign, I was out on hubbard 20 days ago. It was slow, water was 60f, I tried thumping down by the dam. There were small 8 to 10" sandies under my boat by the thousands and thousands! Hopefully those batches of sandies will grow into magnums in a few weeks and not flush down the gates with more rain we are expecting...