The dates for the event this year are April 18-20. Trace Adkins will be performing, fresh off of his runner-up effort on Donald Trump’s Celebrity Apprentice.
Last year the Toyota Texas Big Bass Classic was nice. There was lots of food and things to buy and plenty of booths to visit. This year they are charging $20 a head to walk in the gate so you can pay $4 for a hotdog, $2 for a coke or drink a $3 beer inside the roped off area.
I think this event will be a flop compared to last year due to the cover charge. The promoter has apparently lost touch with how to make an event a hit so that the sponsors and vendors do well and come back years later. This event was very well done last year, look back in the archives and you will see where I said that, but to charge people $20 to walk in the door means that a typical family will be out $200 by the time they pay for parking, some refreshments and a few trinkets from the vendors.
I’m glad I am not one of the vendors who agreed to pay a premium price for a booth only to find out later that the promoter has gotten greedy and is charging fans $20 to walk in the door. Between the sponsors’ contributions to the event and the amount they sell the TV rights for, there is plenty of money to be made without charging $20 at the door. The promoters are trying to get rich here and I suspect they will be dealt a dose of reality by East Texas fishing fans.

Here’s a little change of pace. I am visiting friends in Florida and we went out and got on some nice Spanish Mackerel. We had a great time, caught some fish and made it through some pretty rough water. These Mackerel are real fighters.
Thanks to my good friend Alan Hamilton for having me over to do some fishing. He promises to make a trip to Lake Fork to catch some bass soon.
We’re heading back out tomorrow for more. We are headed southwest to Bull Bay, near Boca Grande in search of more and bigger fish. Details to come.

Caution: This video contains “R-rated” words.

It was too nice to stay home today, so I grabbed Judi and we headed for the lake. Inspired by the comments to this post, I had to go fishing.
We got out around 3 and headed to Birch Creek. There were a good many boats out today. We got one fish in a cove just north of the 515 bridge on the west fork. Not a serious fishing trip, but a nice time on the water and one decent fish as you see in the video below.
Surface temps are rising on Lake Fork. The Spring bite will soon be ON!

I went to visit my friend Jim Dax and we fished his private pond.
Jim has 90 acres just outside of Winnsboro, Texas with a 5 acre pond on it. He has it stocked with Florida Bass. They aren’t huge, but they are plentiful. We caught dozens of fish in a 2 1/2 hour period of time on this Thursday morning.
There are bigger bass in this pond in the 5 to 7 pound range. We didn’t find them on this trip, but we had a blast catching the feisty bass we caught. At one time towards the end, I was catching a fish on almost every cast with a 1/4 oz. chrome and blue Rattle Trap.
Thanks Jim! This was a lot of fun.

I went out yesterday for a few hours, from about noon to 3, before the daily thunderstorms ran me off. I caught one small fish on a Fluke in about 20′ of water, using a large splitshot sinker about two feet in front of it to get it down.
Bass should be schooling pretty soon, but I didn’t see any evidence of this.
The water on Lake Fork is very high because of the torrential rains we have had in the area this Spring/Summer. Many of the locals are saying that this messes up the fishing because they open the spillway to let some of the water out and that seems to kill the bite. I am not familiar with this, but I can tell you that I have not talked to anyone in the past month or two who has had any real success.
It will all come back to life when the weather stabilizes and the water levels are back to their normal level.

I sat outside at the house Saturday morning drinking my coffee looking at the incredibly calm, overcast skies thinking, “man I wish I was on the lake fishing topwater”. So I hopped in the car and headed for the lake. By the time I made the 20 mile drive it was about 12:30 and I had bluebird skies and a constant 15-20 mph south wind. The perfect overcast topwater day was gone.

First I went south and worked a few main lake points with a deep diving crankbait and a Rat-L-Trap. No luck. So I headed north of the 515 bridge and worked the same point that produced the small schooling fish last week and got nothing. I was hungry and it windy to comfortably fish the places I needed to be fishing, so I went back to camp and took a break.

I went back out about 6:30 and went to the point where I found the schooling fish last week and caught one decent bass, about 2 pounds I would guess. I missed three others, all of them very, very small. I have switched to a medium heavy 7′ rod for cranks and such and what happens with the smaller fish is that you end up actually pulling them out of the water before they get to the boat and they are able to shake loose because their body isn’t heavy enough to allow for a good hook set. I guess it’s just the same, they get away unharmed and I keep fishing. These points hold bigger fish. I just need to find them. Next time out I will work it with a Carolina rig in hopes of better fish.

I hate to say never, but fishing on a Saturday at Fork is just crazy. There are two to three boats on every point and a frenzy of activity. I much prefer to fish during the week but it hasn’t worked out that way lately. If you can, I suggest fishing Fork during the week. There is a big difference in the boat traffic and fishing pressure and number of people in general on the weekend. I saw two different boats pulling a tuber in the boat row. Other boats are passing and there are big stumps to the right. I have to admit I have never seen that. It might be allowed but it seems dangerous to me.

I went out Friday and fished major points. I tried a Carolina rig, medium and deep diving crankbaits, a wacky worm and everything else I had, but I was unable to get a good bite.

What I did find were a lot of schooling bass about 10-12″ long. All fish I caught were on a Rat-L-Trap. In the morning I used the 1/4 ounce chrome with a blue back and in the afternoon, since it was cloudy, I tied on a chartreuse 1/2 ounce model with an orange belly and a black back. I probably have not fished that color in 10 years, but it seemed to be what I needed.

In the morning, on my very first cast with a Rat-L-Trap I caught a small bass in about 25′ of water off of a point and on the first cast of the afternoon session (after the morning storm had passed) I caught a fish on the very first cast with the chartreuse color. Everywhere I went, I tried to get the larger fish down deeper to bite, but they would not. I ended up catching 10 or so on the Rat-L-Traps but none of any size larger than about 14″.

The morning session was cloudy and ended with a strong storm coming through. I got out of the way of it just in time. The afternoon was cloudy until about 7 when the sun came out just before it went down, creating a beautiful sunset on Lake Fork.

At least I caught some fish. I would rather have gotten the better fish to bite but it was not to be. I threw everything I had at them at all depths, worked the grassline, worked the deep timber but still had a pretty good time catching the smaller schooling fish.