when I caught the bass in the picture in 1995. It weight 7.98 pounds, after transporting it to get weighed for over an hour in the hot sun, in the bed of my truck in an icechest that it would not fit in, with no ice.
This fish was certified at thew 7.98 pound by TPWD.
I had the fish skin mounted and on a plastic mold. the molds come without the head, so the head of the fish, and skin are scales are real.
Over the years, several people who have visited my home asked what kind of bass it was, and I always said, well its a largemouth.
several people told me, well it looks more like a spotted bass, and I never thought anything of it. so recently I started doing research and found that if it is indeed a spotted bass, it will eclipse the current texas state record by alot!
I got the central texas wildlife biologist involved, mr Tibbs, and he connected me with a geneticist in the state. scale samples were sent, but the results were inconclusive. The next thing I have to do is bring the entire mount, to the geneticist for further testing, I think he is going to do a scraping of the bone in the head area. If this fish turns out to be a spotted bass, which we believe it is, I will have held the spotted bass record, for the state of texas, for over 26 years.
I was informed that sometimes the taxidermist will paint the fish to look how every he wants, but that does not explain the head. the jawline is spot on, the mouth, everything to suggest it is a spotted bass. being the fish still has its actual scales, im not sure if the fish was even painted at all. The taxidermist used Borax to dry out the skin , it is a white powdery substance. it affected the scale samples I sent to be examined off the back of the fish. so hopefully bone scraping samples will be more helpful in an official ID. below are some current pics of the mount. the fish is 24 inches long with a girth of 18 inches, 7.98 pounds,.

note on the weight certification it says largemouth, but although many game wardens are very knowledgeable about fish species, the possibility that it could be a spotted bass may have eluded the person who certified it, as it did myself. At the time, my thoughts were that there were largemouth bass, and smallmouth bass,. spotted bass was not even a thought,

That is interesting.

Do you have a picture with the tail in it? Doesn’t look like a spot to me.

Cool story!

So it came from a lake on Fort Hood? That would make me a bit skeptical about it being a spot.

Not sure...

it does not look like a spot but what do I know.

What lake?

heiner lake on ft hood in killeen tx. maybe 15 to 18 acres, public fishing lake.

why is that , central texas has alot of spotted bass in many lakes, also ft hood has a stocking program that has gone on for many decades, from bass to rainbow trout.

I will; take one and post it later for you, thanks for the look.

curious, what is it you see that makes u think its not a spotted bass? thanks

heres a pic with a soda can to give perspective ...

Very cool story

Does it have any teeth on it's tongue?