The memories you have!

armadilla: Not many of us are so lucky to pick the right mate, treat her right, have a family and tons of memories. Just be a really good roadie! She deserves some good treatment. IslandJim

Thanks for posting. It can’t be easy to move on from fishing, I know you and your wife loved it. I enjoyed your message and pics. I’m 72 and know where you’re coming from.

Not sure if you remember me but you reached out to me back around 2010 or so following a Bohemian Tourney on Whitney that I won and my son came in 7th fishing out of the same boat. I think your question was “how the heck did you do that”. We had a good talk, I enjoyed it

Good luck going forward.

I think I remember that conversation... I think you caught over 30 lbs on a 5 fish limit.... And, I think I remember the location you told me about .. the Towash cross roads... We tested it a few times but never caught any there. However, we also eventually achieved days like that on Whitney... throwing back 5 and 6 lbers on consecutive casts... Whitney has a lot of fish that congregate in spawning locations and locations where fish school up... and then you can catch them in bunches like that... but, for us it took years of practicing FISHING versus CATCHING. I just looked through my archive of pictures but sadly I don't have the ones from the 2010 Bohemian. Terrible... I have over 15,000 photos in my collection, but not those. And some Chinese hackers destroyed my Whitney Lake Online website where a lot of fishing knowledge was documented along with pictures like the 2010 Bohemian.

Today is what we would classify as a perfect fishing day.... but this morning, I was drinking coffee on my patio playing ball with my Labrador rather than chunking a Spook... We were watching the sun come up over the trees rather that being on the lake watching it come up over the water... most days now it is a major chore for me just to get up. I am thinking about putting a bass boat seat on my patio... I already have one in my shop at my work table.... they are more comfortable, just feels more natural.

I have a 2018 GMC Sierra just like yours, and that boat looks sharp behind it. I dream of my wife getting hooked on fishing so she will let me buy such a boat. She will go with me occasionally, but just to get some sun. I have a 2017 Tracker 175 so it isn't exactly a chick magnet that makes her feel sexy.

My wife loves worm fishing.

Love the pics and history - thanks for sharing!

Maybe you could split the cost of a boat slip with someone and switch to crappie.

Always enjoyed your fishing reports. Good luck going forward!

Over the years I've seen that red Nitro many a time going over the Katy bridge whether I was going deer hunting or pulling the boat to the ramp to fish. Even met ya once @ the McCown ramp years ago while I was pre-fishing for the Bohemian, believe you said Whitney had been on fire that year but yall didn't fish tournaments, just fun fished. I hadn't seen you post in awhile, was hoping all was well

Here is what I will tell y’all about our fishing experience on Lake Whitney. AFTER we retired, we only fished during the week and we avoided Holidays at all costs. Ramp traffic made me crazy as did boat traffic near where we were fishing. I was never very good with the electronics, but did use the sonar for monitoring the depth. We grew up fishing shallow water with lots of trees and stumps, Whitney doesn’t offer that structure. We had to learn to fish rock structures and deep water. We had to learn to fish water that was much clearer. Not having or being good with electronics meant that lake knowledge was essential. We learned to fish with lighter lines and to fish greater distances from the boat. Longer casts. In the main lake section of Whitney, there isn’t much to hang or snag on. We learned to just let fish run until they wore out. Lighter lines also worked better in the clearer water, fish just are less likely to see it. We caught 90% of our fish on Texas rigged10 inch purple plastic worms. Big lures catch big fish. If we hung a worm up, we broke it off, it was better than disturbing the location or even worse damaging the trolling motor or the boat. Worms are cheap, trolling motor and fiberglass repair is very expensive. We caught 99% of our bass within sight of the Katy bridge. It was always humorous to was folks drop their boats in then blast off running out of sight when plenty of fish were close. We learned to fish rocky points, ledges, and flats with some type of structure. Old building foundations were good. We learned that certain locations were more productive than others and in the most recent years, primarily fished only those locations. Our style fishing does not fit the needs of tournament fishing. It was more like going to watch a professional baseball game versus an NBA game. Just sit back and enjoy it. Scheduling a trip was mostly driven by the wind, it had to be less than 10 mph, and preferably less than 5 mph. Partly cloudy was the best, no thunderstorms but cloudless, bright sunshine days were OK. Most days we fished 4 hours or less. If we used top water lures, it was Zara Spooks or other large lures for schooling fish. Occasionally, we fished with lipless crank baits for schooling bass, but that invited too many white bass and striped bass, which was.fine if we were not having any luck with bass.

In the last 10 years, we fished for bigger fish. We had caught, cleaned and eaten all the smaller fish we wanted in our lifetime. So our fishing logic was geared to that, bigger bass. And we like RED.

Dilla & Ms Dilla,

Neat post, I really enjoyed the post and pics.

Nice story, hate to see you two hanging up the rods and reels. We need more like you and your wife. You may not remember but we’ve met and talked several times. Back in 2010 or so, we talked following a Bohemian Tourney on Whitney. You contacted me after my son and I finished 1st and 7th (fishing out of the same boat). I think your question was “how the heck did you do that”. I tried acting like a pro and rambling on. Truth is, we just landed on a pile of fish. Good memory for me, hope you remember.

Take care, enjoy, stay busy. Bet you can’t stay off the water.

Yep I remembered. Scroll back up some and you will see my response. Right below your first post. But I have found it’s hard for someone to catch another man’s fish.

Just wish we were fishing today.