Seven of us are going to Whitney near the end of April to fish for stripers, and none of us have experience there. We have fished for stripers at Texoma and done well, so we have striper experience - just not at Whitney. We are looking for any helpful intel like what is the pattern in late April, what lures to use, which parts of the lake are best, should we look for gulls, or are there structures where stripers hang out? If you have useful info but don't want to make it public, if you will send me a PM, I will keep your info confidential. Thanks in advance for any and all help.

PM sent

Would you also share with me and my 11 year old grandson? I can find plenty of eater catfish but he loves the sandies and stripers; Thanks!

By late April, as warm as it has been, the shad spawn should be in full bloom. There will be shore birds that will give away any feeding action, at dawn and dusk. After that just check the normal structure areas. Humps, points, etc. the sandies will be feeding heavy and the stripers will usually be under them. I am sure you already know what I just wrote, so probably not much help.

Hopefully the birds will be working for you, but you may have to look around for them. Fish could be either side of the 1713 bridge in late April. If the birds are sitting on the surface, wait on them to get up, or drop live bait. Not many humps, so look at ledges and creek intersections. Voodoo shad, whopper ploppers, umbrellas for surfacing fish.

Thanks a bunch!

Dennis I’d like to know when y’all are coming?

Good info, wife has booked a weekend for the eclipse April 7th/8th and she told me I have to bring the boat...so I will get to fish Whitney for the first time!...I will continue to listen to y'all.

April is usually a good shallow top water month, early mornings around the island and the willows around Frazier creek and state park area, later in the morning schooling fish can be found from McCown to the dam, humps near the main river channel (navionics with sonsr charts on shows em best, lakemaster is not good on Whitney)can also be real productive with casting slabs and jigs and bouncing them off the bottom and working them back to the boat

More thanks!

You might want to think about fishing somewhere else. A strong fishing buddy claims "Whitney used to be good - but now there is just something wrong. Don't know what - but something is wrong."

I don't fish the main lake but do fish the Brazos and Nolan upriver from the lake. White and Black Bass used to be great - now I struggle so much I rarely go.

Did well on Brazos below Whitney dam a few years ago.

Belton and Stillhouse Dam lakes - in same area - are reporting good white bass.

Good luck - hope I am wrong and you catch a bunch on Whitney.

Wow! Can anyone who fishes there regularly weigh in on the current fishing status of Whitney? We are going in hopes of catching stripers.

The Striper population on Whitney has seemed to have had an impact on the other species. Those that fish for crappie and, sand bass and the other bass believe the Stripers have taken a toll the numbers and most likely have. . The Striper fishing however is good.

Thus the bait situation is in peril. BTW what is live bait status on Whitney ?? Bait population of PK due to the recent kill, has dwindled ! Should be a stellar live bait catching season.

In the same boat want to go fish Whitney not to far from. Anyone with knowledge on the lake is welcome to come join. Dennis if you need a second boat let me know.

That is a good looking boat ! Never seen boat jack that far from front .

Boat needs a good coating of striper blood !! Shaken not stirred !

This IS the guy you need to be listening to about fishing on Whitney.

Guess that's how Skeeter sitting up that bay boat never had any issues with it yet it's actually probably the easiest trailer I've had to load an offload by myself

The river bite is on.
As far as Whitney being off, idk ,,, it’s full and lots of water to look over. Another oddity for Whitney is I’m seeing more bait than ever. Those fish don’t have to go far to eat.

Me and the boys: Nice boat! Thanks for the offer, but we have 3 boats already lined up. If you plan to fish the same days we are there, send me a PM with your cell number and we can communicate while on the lake to share where we are catching fish.

Dennis
Top water action should be full blown by then. You not looking for schooling action on top. The threadfin spawn and ideal water temps gets this going. 7' Redfins waked back to the boat around white cranes hopping down the bank is ideal. Any place like points and humps were the water comes from deep to shallow can be great. If you can get some good size shad then drag them behind the boat under a balloon while waking the redfins close to the bank. You just have to have faith that this works and do it. Take your heart medication because the strike can really catch you off guard. Watch the lure. If a fish swirls and misses don't stop it. Keep it coming and he will come back or another fish will get it. Google you tube for Waking Redfins.
The fish could really be anywhere this time of year. Most likely concentrate you efforts from the Katy Bridge to the dam. Stained water at night is your best bet on catching live shad.
Shad could be tough to get on the main lake. I would suggest getting them up the lake or in the river. Later in the morning in late April fish areas that are 25-30 deep using live shad, swim baits and jigs.
If fishing striper jigs I use Yum Dingers and cut the dinger down so the bait is about the size of the baits there currently eating.



I can't comment on the fishing at Whitney in recent months. I have fished there a great deal and have been successful.

You should find fish at one or more of the following locations: Dam side of the island, in front of Lake Whitney state park, and a few hundred yards off the point at McCown Valley Park. Those places are well known by everybody who fishes lake Whitney. Take a pair of binoculars. Wherever you see 5 - 50 boats clumped up together you will find the fish as well. Whitney stripers like white slabs bounced off the bottom, but they love live shad. If you know how to throw a cast net then take it with you. Live shad always catch more than artificials on Whitney. All the guides and most private boats catch their shad at Lake Aquilla and haul them to whitney. Lake Aquilla is about 12 minutes from whitney. The only way you are going to catch shad on whitney is to get there before daylight and shine a bright light in the water to attract them. Catching shad after daylight is near impossible on Whitney.

RANDY and CDS, thanks for the tips. All of our crowd are diehard artificial lure anglers, so your tips on what lures to use is greatly appreciate - as well as all the other good intel.

As far as artificial baits for whitney I have caught the most on the Bomber white slab. Second place would be a 4" white swim bait. When trolling I have caught a lot of stripers using a white hellbender with an all white P-Line Flash Striper Jig tied behind the hellbender. I tie the jig to the eye closest to the bill on the hellbender to get down as deep as possible, and I put the jig about 2 feet behind the hellbender. Then troll at a depth that the rig bounces along the bottom. . I lose 1 or 2 rigs per trip doing it that way due to hang ups, but I catch 5 times more fish bouncing it off bottom rather than playing it safe and trolling deep water where the rig never touches the bottom. That rig usually trolls 25ft - 35ft deep. I have tried chartreuse on Whitney, but white always produces more fish for me.

Fishing was kinda tough today, took a while to find em good and stacked up. When i found em it was even more difficult to figure out what they wanted. But after a lot of trial and error i was able to figure out they wanted soft plastics reeled really slow along the bottom, nothing else worked. Found the fish on structure, spot lock and cast out and slowly drag it back till they move then go look for them again. water temp still a little cool for the good fishing. 63-68. Water was really clear in the big part of the lake, can see bait 8-10' down

Thanks a bunch! Great graphs. I assume these were stripers. What sizes of fish were you catching? What length and color soft plastics and weight of jig head?

The avg striper on Whitney right now is about 3-5 lbs. Was using ¾ oz to 1 oz chartreuse jig heads with white 6" flukes

Is there any submerged timber we need to worry about? If so, what areas?

Yes, north of the bridge and north of the island. Otherwise, you should be fine.

As an old guide used to say on here, ledges and edges in 20-30’ of water, have always been key for me out there. My most consistent success is on A rigs, but if you find them stacked in an area, then you can try slabbing. Otherwise, just keep your eyes out for boats and birds for TW action. Best seems to be before sunrise, so be on the water early!

For comparison, whenever I fish Twak, 90% of my fish are on slabs whereas out on Whitney, I haven’t had near the success. On the flip side, on Twak I don’t catch any fish trolling like I do out at Whitney.

Good luck and feel free to DM for any more tips!

Thanks! Just to be clear, on the ledges, are you saying the top of the ledge is 20 to 30 fow dropping off into deeper water? Also, two of us pre=fished Whitney last Wednesday and couldn't find any schools of stripers and saw no bird action or boat shows. We did catch 100 white bass and 12 small hybrids on a 28 fow structure. We looked at a lot of river edge drop-offs and creek edge drop-offs and just didn;t see much except the one spot.

You’re on the right path! I’ll DM you for some more direct guidance.