Ye Gods, I've Caught The Carp!

Unlike Satan, I try to take a day off, on Mondays, and what better way to spend part of that than checking out a new place to fish. It's not hard, put some rods in the bed of the truck, buy some kolaches and strong covfeve and off you go.

I arrived at the top secret Texan objective around Noon, after an intensive bout of front office porch work with the flock all morning, and sized things up. It looked right, smelled right, sage and cedar, and felt right. But would it be right and produce a catch?

Sure enough it did. Right out of the gate fish were tugging and thumping against my complex, scientific lure, a worm on a #6 bait holder allied to a single split-shot weight. Nice and easy does it, and then pull, a fish was on the hook and up came the first of five catfish. Good result.

Remembering that movement is a sign of life, I changed position and gently twitched the almost free floating bait along the bottom, but not for long. Something like Jan Sobieski's Hussars plowed into the hook with the kinetic energy of an ironclad phalanx.

Was it a monster catfish, a Leviathan Bass or something else, perhaps a dolphin? Hard to tell, as the monster of the deep dived, pulled, thrashed and eventually came to the surface. A carp, a huge great carp. Back you go, my friend.

Another even fiercer carp blew up the line again, in just the same spot, and I reeled it in only lose the hook as I brought the beast to land. But so what, we'd battled and one came out the victor. Sorry, carp, you lose this round.

And that was that. Pretty much a fish with every cast and we didn't even have a boat.

Tight lines,

LSP

Breakfast And Fish

One of the things I like to do is go to the local Cowboy Church's men's breakfast. They're good guys who aren't afraid of their faith and I always leave uplifted in spirit. Speaking of which, one of the cowboys had lifted up his Jeep, it's called Bad Santa.

After a frugal meal of scrambled eggs, biscuits and gravy, I went fishing with a couple of the breakfasteers on Lake Whitney, on a boat. It was neat to scud over the choppy water at speed, with the spray and the wind whipping past. Similar, in a way, to an all out run on a horse; a whole lot of speed. I like that.

We cast about in coves, inlets and along sand bars and banks but the going was slow. Then Seagulls appeared, feasting on baitfish and sure enough, a school of Sand Bass wasn't far behind. There they were, churning up the water in a ferocious feeding frenzy.

Brisk action and it was catch as fast you could cast and then the Sandies were gone, surging after their prey. We got on them, along with a few Stripers, two more times before they disappeared into the depths. Big fun.

Then it was time to head back to the Compound, mission accomplished.

Thanks, JH and SO. Great result.

Fish on,

LSP

Super Spook

A lot of people are saying that the Team's gone off-mission. They think that the primary objective of fighting the War on Weather, building an ARK (Advanced Rescue Kraft) and fishing has been forgotten. Forgotten and replaced by theological reflection. I understand, it's a concern, but you can do both. 

Look What The Weather's Done

To prove that, I went Lake Whitney and deployed a Super Spook. No, not a well known member of the Intelligence Community, but a topwater lure. To be honest, I didn't think I'd catch anything, as the lake was choppy and well above its normal water level, all thanks to our enemy, the Weather.

Spook Caught a Fish

Still, I figured the Spook might be large and noisy enough to attract any Bass that were lurking under the waves. So I cast off, and bang, a Hybrid hit the lure like it was going out of style, then another slammed into it. Well done, Spook, you work. 

Those in Peril on The Sea

But so too does our enemy and its not been idle, sending torrential rain down onto the Lone Star State in an apocalyptic display of power. You could see that today on lake Whitney, which resembled a turbulent inland sea.

A Typical Texas Streetscape

Smart Texans are moving to high ground, building ARKs and improving their fishing skills.

Fish on,

LSP

Fishing

Don't get me wrong, shooting is great, but fishing is neat too. So I loaded up the truck with some rods and headed off to Lake Whitney.

The Lake's still high and right  out of the gate one of the team caught a Bass with a long tail worm on a Texas rig. Big excitement, which was tempered, a bit, by the young 'un dropping the fish before we could get a picture. It swam away to fight again another day. 

Then one of the boys fell in the lake and had to dry out in the sun while the other caught a fish with his cowboy hat. The hat was strangely waterproof; you can get them from Cavender's for $24. Keeps the sun off and doubles as a net, quite a deal.

Later on a  friendly fisherman gave us a couple of Perch to use as bait and that was fun but didn't result in any strikes. He'd been there since 5.30 am and had only caught Perch, 6 of them.

As midday came and went, and the sun beat down, we headed for the Compound.

Well done, Team, and you never know, maybe next time I'll catch something...

LSP