Hermine Comes for a Visit

Posted By on September 9, 2010

Sometimes Mother Nature has a way of slamming the door shut on one’s fishing.  Such is the case today, as tropical storm Hermine dumped over 10 inches of rain on parts of N. Texas.

At this writing, we have received just over 8.5″ in the last 24 hours and Lake Ray Roberts has gone up 16″since yesterday evening (an amazing increase – with more water still flowing in).  This will definately change things on the lake.

The carp fishing was beginning to enter the “wind down” phase anyway.  At this time of year most of their food sources have thinned out of the flats and they start eating things like grass and snails ( you can see blades of loose grass in the flats).  The increase of water level could bring them up on a feed in a few days, as they push into areas of vegetation recently flooded.  This won’t last long and would probably be ended by the next “cool” front, but could give us a last “hoorah” on the flats.

As for the sand bass, it will take them several days to get back to any kind of pattern.  This time of year USUALLY has some great topwater action in the evening so we’ll just have to see how they recover.

Many thanks to Bart Larmouth from Tailwaters and Shannon Drawe of TexasFlycaster for the fishing reports this weekend.  My household was invaded by an intestinal virus and we had a verylow-key (read that “home-bound”) Labor Day.  I had to fish vicariously through them.  The basic concensus was that the fish were spooky and a little deeper than normal which coincides with late season food shortages.

Categories: Fishing Report
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About the author

Joel Hays has been a professional guide since 1990, and has guided professionally in Colorado and Texas.

Comments

One Response to “Hermine Comes for a Visit”

  1. admin says:
    September 14, 2010 at 3:26 am

    WoW! Looks like my back yard. Where was that photo taken Joel?

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North Texas Fly Fishing Adventures with Joel Hays

Imagine wading through ten inches of clear water,trying to be as quiet as possible. Fifty feet ahead is a pod of large fish "tailing" on the flat. You strip out fly line, make the cast, and pull your fly in front of the lead fish. After agonizing seconds the fish spots the fly, rushes forward for a quick grab, and feels the hook. The silence is broken as the fish accelerates across the flat, quickly exposing backing on your screaming reel. Sounds like a great day on the coast, or even an exotic bonefish flat, right? Actually it's a great description of the usual day my clients have fishing for Carp on the flats of Lake Ray Roberts where many clients are blown away by the water clarity and the actual ability to sight cast along miles of flats. Big spooky fish in shallow water. They fight and tail like Redfish and can sometimes rival Bonefish in nervousness. This is an EXCELLENT WAY to hone your flats fishing skills and test your "eyes" where it's more about stalking the fish than simply stumbling upon them. You will be a better flats angler!