Passport to Texas

This is passport to Texas

The annual arrival of colorful, fun-to-catch rainbow trout gets underway this month and continues through March.

02—They’re a good fish to catch and a good fish to eat.

Carl Kittle oversees the Texas Parks and Wildlife trout-stocking program. This year they’ll distribute 285-thousand of the fish.

12—Each winter we try to create an opportunity for fishermen. Right now we’re doing over a hundred and twenty sites, with rainbow trout being stocked almost all over the state.

It gets too hot in Texas to support a natural population of rainbow trout, so anglers have to get ’em while it’s cold.

11—You can catch them with live bait. You can catch them with corn or some other bait; and certainly, they’re great on spinners and even fly-fishing. What about a cane pole? A cane pole and a worm is one of the best ways to catch trout.

Kittle says although relatively easy to catch, rainbow trout can offer a challenge to anglers.

11—In that they are aware of people above the water, and they can see out of the water if the water is clear. So, sometimes you have to be a little bit cautious about letting the fish see you from above while you’re fishing.

Maybe it would help if you disguised yourself as a hunter.

Find the trout-stocking schedule at the Texas Parks and Wildlife website.

That’s our show…with support from the SF Restoration Program… helping to fund fish hatchery management and operations in Texas.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

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This is Passport to Texas

For the past four years, the Toyota Texas Bass Classic, this year at Lake Conroe, has reinvented the way bass tournaments are fished.

11— What they do in this tournament different than other tournaments; the bass that are caught in the tournament are immediately weighed, measured and immediately released in the boat, instead of coming to a staged weigh-in.

Dave Terre is Texas parks and Wildlife Department Chief of fisheries. While bringing fish to shore for display is permissible, 99% of the bass caught, go back into the lake, with an estimated 100% survival.

18—And this is accomplished by putting judges in each of the pro anglers’ bass boats. These judges basically weigh and measure the fish for the angler, then they are recorded—matter of fact, they’re called into a central control tower by radio—and the fish then are immediately released; no harm.

The Pro Angler’s Association sanctions the Bass Classic tournament and, in cooperation with Texas Parks and Wildlife, was instrumental in developing this new judging method to promote conservation of the species.

18—This is a group of folks who are all about conservation. They want to change the way bass tournaments are fished, in this country, and so a couple of years ago we did an impromptu survey of the pro anglers that participate in this tournament. A very high percentage of them feel like this could be the future of the way bass tournaments are fished.

Learn more about fisheries management and see photos from the Bass Classic at www.toyotatexasbassclassic.com.

That’s our show for today… For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

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This is Passport to Texas

Save the household chores for later, because this weekend you need to be at Lake Conroe for the Toyota Texas Bass Classic, where 50 of the country’s top bass anglers will compete for the world championship and $420-thousand dollars prizes.

13—This tournament is assembling the world’s best largemouth bass anglers from across the country. According to bassfan.com, this is the best field ever assembled for any bass tournament in recent memory.

Dave Terre is TPWD Chief of fisheries. The competition benefits the agency’s efforts to introduce young people and urban families to fishing and the outdoors.

15—With this year’s event, the department will receive a million dollars as a direct result of this tournament. TPW takes those funds and puts it back into several different youth outreach programs. One of them being the Neighborhood Fishing program.

Conservation is critical, and during the two days of tournament fishing, pros will have judges aboard their boats.

09—These judges weigh and measure the fish for the angler, and then they are called into a central control tower by radio. The fish then is immediately released with no harm.

Anglers may bring a few fish ashore so the public can see what big healthy bass look like. Find details about the event at toyotatexasbassclassic.com.

That’s our show for today… For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.
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Watch a YouTube video from the Toyota Texas Bass Classic from 2008.

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This is Passport to Texas

What are big and plentiful and ready to give anglers a good fight?

07—Large schools of mature red drum – male and female – aggregating near gulf passes to spawn.

Bill Balboa is ecosystem leader for Galveston Bay. Late summer through fall, bull redfish—called bulls because of their size, not gender—between 28 and 50 inches long, swarm near shore during a Texas style running of the bulls.

20—They call them bulls for a reason, and it’s because they’re very strong fish; they don’t give up easily. So generally most anglers are going to fish for bull reds in the surf using what I would consider typical surf tackle — which is a little bit heavier rod and reel, because what they can expect is a lot of long runs from this fish. They pull very hard. Much like a bull would pull if you had it on a rope.

You can reel in these bull redfish all along the coast, but if you really want to get a workout, head north of Matagorda Bay.

08—A lot of bull red fishing occurs in Sergeant up off of Freeport; Crystal Beach and Bolivar, in that area, and off of Sabine Pass.

That’s our show…made possible by the Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration Program…working to increase fishing, hunting, shooting and boating opportunities in Texas.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

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This is Passport to Texas

For thirty-nine year old Keith Burns, fishing isn’t just a hobby, it’s a family tradition. His grandfather and father both grew up fishing on Caddo Lake in East Texas.

Now it’s our turn to take our kids, or nephews or whatever down there and start fishing.

Burns fishes every free chance he gets. But fishing hasn’t been so good on Caddo Lake for several years because of the invasive giant salvinia plant.

You just kind of had to fish where there was open water. You couldn’t really fish some of your favorite places because of the invasive aquatic life that was in there. I hate that stuff.

Then, flooding and a cold winter killed off some of the giant salvinia, allowing Burns to really fish again. In fact, Burns didn’t just fish. This past March he caught a lake record 16.17-pound sharelunker bass.

I can’t tell you what it meant for me to do that. With the history our family has on that lake, it just meant the world to me.

Burns says he now wants giant salvinia to get off his lakes, and he wants everyone to help make that a reality.

We’ve got to take five minutes and check our trailers and make sure we don’t have any hitchhikers we are taking to another lake and depositing there.

That’s some good advice from a great fisherman.

You can find more information at passporttotexas.org.

That’s our show… we had research and writing help from Gretchen Mahan…the Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration program supports our series… For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

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