Joe Pool stocked with 40K Florida Bass

I was at Joe Pool on Sunday and the operators at the marina told me that back in May the Parks and Wildlife stocked Joe Pool with over 40K of Florida Bass. Has anyone else heard this. Is there a place that you can check to see if this is true?

Heard they stocked just prior to the flood. Nice timing! Pool and grapevine are full of 4-5" bass.

I was catching a lot of 8" to 10" bass and found them schooling down by the dam for about an hour. While I was there I caught a 2 1/2 lb bass. Good fight, lots of fun.

http://tpwd.texas.gov/fishboat/fish/action/stock_bywater.php?WB_code=0582

Actually 75k

Yes.All the fish are grouped up at the state park which is closed.

Yes it really happened. I launched the same time that they did. We were the only 2 boats on the lake. Got to talk to them for awhile before they put them out. Looks like a lot of them made it. Think the flooding gave them plenty of hiding places.

Sweet

Now if they will just get rid of the slot limit

The slot limit is the reason there are giants swimming in the lake

I don't think the slot limit has anything to do with why there are giants swimming in the lake. Most people that keep fish on the lake have no idea there is a slot limit. especially all the bank fisherman. After releasing some fish after weigh in three weeks ago. I was asked by some bank fisherman why I weighed in such small fish. I explained the slot and they had never heard of a slot limit. Most people that know the slot don't keep bass anyways.

The success of Lake Fork is not partially an effect of the slot?

Joe pool is no lake fork. lots of lakes with no slots have lots of quality fish in them. who knows what fork would be like without a slot. I don't think it would me much different. do you think if it didn't have a slot that much more people would go out there just to catch bass to eat? its just my opinion

If the slot limit has an effect on this lake IMHO it has an opposite one. I hardly ever catch bass that are within the slot. A ton of unders with an ocassion over. Isn't the slot limit designed to leave more fish in the lake that are in between the slot? I wonder if others have this same issue or I just do not know where to find 2-4lb fish out there.

i was always under the impression a slot limit is in effect so people will take the smaller fish and leave the bigger ones.

I fish JP and I take my 5 under 14 and clean them

Keep in mind, they stocked them with fingerlings. So after a rough survival period, they will need a few years to grow big.

If no one harvest the smaller bass, the slot does not work long term.

Some years back, a fisheries biologist told me the problem on Joe Pool was "poor recruitment". By that he meant that not enough fish grow fast enough in Pool because of lack of fertility in the lake. We don't have the run off from rich farmlands there that other lakes enjoy. I agree there are some giants in Pool---just not enough of them. I expect 25-30 unders for every one high slot or over. I've just accepted it and enjoy being able to fish so close to home!

That's a good point and I think he's right on, not only with Pool, but all metroplex lakes, and to a lesser extent Ray Roberts, Whitney, Richland, etc.
In general, any lake that has a watershed west of I45 does not get the nutrients that the lakes from East Texas to the East Coast do. That's why Pool, Roberts, and Richland never became the 'next Fork'.

If you want to see someone violating the slot limit,
look for the people on the bank who set out 6-8 lines all over the place.
The man with one rod and reel obeys the slot limit.

Game Wardens say the slot limits are in place because those are the size of fish that have the most successful spawns in a lake.

Me and my cousin have been 3 times in the past 6 days, never less than 30 bass caught, 9/10 were 13+in. Its fishing REALLY good!

Both are generally true.

I would disagree. Think about most of the five through eight pound fish you catch on Lake Fork. What do they look like? Big green beautiful creatures without a blemish or do many of them look beat up with holes in their face? Ask the guides what they see... If it weren't for the slot, you wouldn't be catching a lot of those fish.

Going to joe pool for camping with the family. Taling my son fishing also and I don't want to disappoint him. Anyone know a good spot around the camp grounds and what the bass like??

I haven't been in a couple of weeks but they were very shallow and schooling of points. They seem to like everything from small worms, spoons, crank baits, etc. Mainly small fish so don't go to big on your lure.

Thanks!

I don't know how many of you might have read my description of a telephone conversation I had with a TPWD employee, a biologist, who was filling me (he asked me to call him) in on the issues related to Marine Creek. In essence, he said the issue there was that the lake has a very low nutrient level to support a big shad population. Someone had asked him why they couldn't just stock shad, to which he replied, that where shad exist in good numbers they increase rather easily on their own. So, Marine Creek has tons of smallish resident bass, small girths and some giants, too. And, the main meal in there? Blue gills and other pan fish. He said that, in essence, Marine Creek is like a really big stock tank with bass, catfish and blue gill . . . but rarely shad.

MC was one of 6 lakes chosen for the big test related to infusing it with some fish with lunker genetics. Interestingly, of the 6, when they went out 4 or so years later to see how these fish grew, they actually did better (they had grown more, etc.) in MC than they had in many of the other 5 lakes. Go figure.

I bring this up because when he was describing this lake's particular environment? He mentioned another lake as also having a very low nutrient level:

Joe Pool.


Brad

I don't know about y'all but I've seen shad everywhere on Joe pool and shad even up to 10 inches swimming around in there.... The shad don't have a problem at all

Tyler,

Sometimes science trumps anecdotes.

Here is the most recent assessment on Joe Pool shad:



Brad

I went out Friday by the state park and caught a steady stream of bass from 7-12. Probably caught 40, only 2 were in the slot all the rest were unders. Thats the best I've ever done at joe pool. Usually I only catch 2-5 fish in a morning. They were biting everything I threw as Bobby said.

Finally made it back out Sunday evening. Small fish were schooling of shore. A little larger fish were caught up against the shore in a foot of water. Biting spoons, chatter bait and creature baits on football head.

For over a month, it's been the best fishing that i have ever experienced on any lake.

JP and Lake Fork are the two lakes I fish regularly. Fork has very fertile water, and I always see balls of baitfish on my graphs. JP has some baitfish, but nothing like what I see on Fork. Not to mention fork has so many places for all the fish to hide compared to JP, just by the sheer size of the lake and all of the creeks and pockets, etc. Another thing is that JP has 10X more people fishing from the bank all the time, and I guarantee you most of them keep everything they catch. The best fishing in JP is off-shore, but it is difficult in the summer to spend alot of time out there because of all the party boats and jet skis'. That's never been a problem for me on lake fork.

The locals will enjoy those.


for dinner.