I fished Sunday night and man it was tough. Bait was easy but we could not get the scales knocked off a shad. Not one bite at all. First time I have ever been skunked on Benbrook in the warm months. I fished the RC park and cove next to it. Also fished the point by the dam.I wonderd why there were not alot of boats fishing and now I know.

Thanks Fuzzy, Im going to get out as often as I can... If I'm lucky, every other weekend.

Are you just keeping bait in your livewell or do you have a shad tank. I saw several boats out loading up on bait. Have to give bait a shot next time out.

shad tank is the way to go. Right now they stay alive a little longer because it is cooler but they will do much better in a tank.

Bait in the live well right now -- the temps are low enough, just keep the water flowing through it and they are fine.

It is always tough fishing when they are letting water out of the lake. I think the Benbrook water level has varied more this year than in the past...well, other than last year when they closed it due to floods. I think this small lake and these large level variations is harder on the fishing than a huge lake like Ray Roberts or Texoma.

Whatever it is -- those fish got to start feeding sometime

I just like using the bait tank because if things change and I do actually catch a keeper fish--I got some place to put it. Plus they seem to stay more energetic because of the oxygen in the BT.

Benbrook has been the pits so far. Being such a small lake, the temps and water clarity seem to change quite a bit. I have caught fish everywhere from shallow to the deep humps and points. We usually spend more time looking and graphing fish than we do actually fishing. We go from spot to spot until we find a good number of good size fish. Sandbass are never targetted but on a slow day its nice to catch the random sandy. Shad are still very shallow but the only thing that seems to be chasing them are yellows. I caught many yellows last week in the cast net and also caught a few hybrids. After catching the hybrids, I fished right next to the shore and caught a few. Bite died off around eleven in the morning that day.
Benbrook is a tough lake. Just because you dont catch one day, does not mean you will not catch the next.

Sounds to me like you need a larger boat!

I will dust off the tank then and take it out next time... Worst case scenerio, My boy can play with the bait in the shad tank while i'm trying to catch something!!!

Do you put anything else in the water.. salt, slime XXX, ice, ect..

This time of year -- the shad tank gets a cup of salt/10 gallons of water and I like to use lake water.

I will put my tank back on my boat in about 2 weeks when I head up to Texoma -- shad is always my back up plan

Thanks Fuzzy, I'm reading over your repsonse to my email about keeping shad alive and throwing a net from awhile back. Don't be suprised if I show up to Texoma some weekend and give you a call on the water!! especially if I keep taking a beating at BB

I finally showed back up Fuzzy!
Good to see nefishwilldo, Fuzzy, PiePuncher and Jason out there.

It was awfully slow, but the one I got was a nice one. Caught her on 8 lb test line in 30' of water. She gave that little spinning rod all it wanted.

Good seeing you out there again LL maybe it will pick up soon--I think we were in the right spot.

Oh yeah!!! That's what I was after...I guess that is what most of us were after

Love that light tackle fishing...I got some spinning rods strung up with 10 lb braid and medium light rods -- it is a blast for the neighborhood kids!!!