Lake Corpus...?

I have a trip to the area coming up in December, I was hoping to see if anyone thought fishing Lake Corpus Christi was worth it? I don't have a boat and I know there's gators so I was hoping to find a guide or something...but no dice. If anyone has a suggestion it would be appreciated. Obviously there will be coastal fishing to do, but I was really hoping to check out some south Texas freshwater too. Thanks

I live in Corpus Christi and have spent hundreds if not thousands of hours on lake Corpus Christi throughout the years but only fished it for crappie and catfish. A few years ago I attempted to bass fish it. Summer time. Full day sun up to sun down without a bite. Next week I fished sun down to sun up without a bite. A few days later sun up to sun down without a bite. No I dont suck that bad at bass fishing. Fished shallow, fished deep, fished cover, all likely offshore structure, fished standing timber, fished bluff walls, fished docks, even found shell beds and fished them hard. Nada. All techniques including finesse and hard thumping and vibrating baits at night. Never fished it again for bass. Choke is worth the extra drive. With that being said the lake does have bass. Local clubs fish it and a few of the guys have figured it out and do well. The water now is dropping quickly but the State Park ramps are still open. The river is getting shallow but will have the only vegetation in the lake in the form of hyacinth here and there. Not sure if its deep enough below it for punching or not. The best option for bank fishing is more than likely the state park due to plenty of shoreline access. Dont worry about gators. Of all the hours I have spent on that lake I have never seen one even at night although there have been a few sighted and even photographed. They are there but very rare which is strange because Choke is loaded and just up river.

I think I was reading your experience elsewhere in the forum lol. There's just not a lot of information on it out there and I can't find even a whisper of any guides who also go there. Seems like everyone is on either side of it; the east hill country lakes (austin/travis/canyon etc), west hill country (buch/ivie/choke), the border lakes, or saltwater. I've read varying things about the quality of fishing so it's not a surprise that it's sort of the odd man out. If I had a boat I'd just be asking for any hazard coordinates anyone had, for both lakes lol. Maybe someday.
I spent January in San Antonio and went to Choke a handful of times, did reasonably well considering how low the water is and how cold it was. Makes shore access a bit of a chore, but there's a decent little jetty I think in the Callaham unit. Caught a handful of 3.5 and lowers there. The grass and submerged vegetation was pretty intense just about everywhere else I tried to go casting. I would imagine it's fishing pretty good in a boat. I've shore fished most of the state park lakes over 1000 acres in Texas at this point, but I haven't been to Corpus and I was hoping to see if that was something I could do since I'm going to be there anyway. I may just suck it up and go elsewhere, even though I'm staying in corpus.

There’s a reason you can’t find a guide at Corpus! Choke is only like 30min from there. Choke would be better on its worse day! Plus there’s guides. I just got back from Rockport. I’d just head on down to the salt water this time of the year! Regardless: GOOD LUCK!

After looking at Corpus on ChartViewer...I think I can see why I'm going to wind up on Choke Canyon or the coast. Yikes.

Did you drop the chart to the current lake levels?

At current level Corpus Christi is 13,763 acres. Choke is 13,615.

I'm just using the free desktop site for basic lake information, but choke is a much better constructed reservoir for bass fishing from what I can see. Despite their surface area being roughly the same, corpus is 10-12% more full. I've never really done well at the older shallower reservoirs. Given that I'll be there in December it's hard to know what the water levels will look like, or how the season will affect the Corpus experience - most of what i'm reading here is summer fishing experience. But I would assume that choke will be better longer in this drought period, even if it is only one third full. it's a deeper lake. There is a real possibility that neither lake will be particularly fishable by the time I'm there, and I may wind up in saltwater anyway.

The only reason why you wouldn’t be able to fish from the banks, would be because of the hydrilla around the edge. Now if you’re actually getting a guide, then the grass doesn’t matter. Never heard of a single guide fishing Mathis, but maybe there is one.

I grew up in Corpus and I have never heard of a single person fishing that lake. I was a saltwater guy, but still, I spent 18 years there and I never talked to a single person about fishing that lake. Pretty weird imo. I always thought it might be pretty good since all the pressure is on the coast. Good luck man, give the laguna madre a shot if you can't find the bass.

Same here Lord. I grew up in Corpus and I don’t know anyone that had success. Been to the lake many times in my life and tried to bass fish it with little success. My favorite place as a kid was Webers Landing and Saturday nights at Fiesta Marina and the Rifle Club. It was called Lake Mathis back in those days. Lots of grass etc…., so I don’t know why it doesn’t fish better. Most people just go after catfish and gar.