OPERATION WORLD RECORD2: A program that begins and 
ends with Texas' sport anglers ... we'll explain on Passport 
to Texas ... 
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Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife

Your chance of landing the next world record bass in 
Texas gets better all the time thanks to Operation World 
Record, a program that is --as the name implies -- 
dedicated to creating world record bass for Texas 
anglers.

"We want it for our sportsmen. Texas has never produced a bass 
over twenty pounds. And it's been our goal since we brought 
Florida bass into the state to shoot for the world record."

Allen Forshage is Director of the Texas Freshwater 
Fisheries Center. He says lunkers donated to the 
program have been bred, and are passing on their 
superior genetics to their offspring. And for the first time, 
since the program started, TFFC is releasing six-inch 
fingerlings into Texas waters.

"We're taking these fingerlings that have been produced in the 
program, raising them to six-inches, and then putting them into 
public lakes so we can follow their growth over time. The 
reason we're trying to raise six-inch fish is they have greater 
survival when put into existing populations."

In the three years Operation World Record has been 
collecting and breeding fish, we've yet to see a 20-pound 
specimen. And there's a good reason for that.

"We cannot breed those males for three years to the incoming 
sharelunkers, because they're too small and they may become 
lunch, instead of a mate."

In time, though, Forshage feels confident that before too 
long, Texas anglers will reel in the next world record.

That's our show ... made possible today by a grant from 
the Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration Program ... For 
Texas Parks and Wildlife ... I'm Cecilia Nasti.