Lake LBJ

Rachel and I got an invite to go fish LBJ yesterday with Tom Martens. Tom just picked up his 2011 Ranger Z521, so we were cruising in style. I got a chance to drive the boat some, and it's a Cadillac!! Here's a couple of fish we put in the boat late in the afternoon.... We caught these on finesse worms, but the frog bite and crankbait bite was also good. The next club tourney is on LBJ, so this was a good warm-up!

Tourney report - July

Here's a couple fish that Bryan and I caught on wednesday night. I caught the one on the left on a black lizard, and Bryan caught the one on the right on a Senko. Unfortunately, we had a cracked engine bracket and couldn't make it to weigh in. We would have gotten 4th out of 23 teams. Today I fished the Big Sandy Creek bass club tournament on Lake Georgetown with Lorne Dornak. We got 3rd, and my 11.2 lbs was good enough for me to keep my #2 spot. Time to crank out a couple more rods before I head south to fish the tarpon division of TIFT in Keith's new Panga!

Boys & Girls Club Rod

This is a rod that my dad's church donated to Gerald Gathwright, the director of the Boys & Girls Club of Harlingen. It is a 7' Phenix S700MH blank with a blue cactus butt, carbon fiber spinning seat, and custom metallic decals. The guides on this one are titanium plated Fuji's.

Crown Royal Tuna Sniper

This is a Crown Royal themed 8'6" OTI tuna sniper. It has an Alps triangle reel seat and Alps gimbal, ribbed EVA rear grips covered with shrink grip, dark purple and gold marbling with a Crown label on top, hypalon foregrip, purple trim rings, and Fuji K series guides. This one's going to be putting the hurt on the tarpon in South Texas!!!

Texas Flats Grand Slam

This weekend, on 7/3, I caught my first Texas Flats Grand Slam! It started on the first cast of the day wih a 32" snook! From there, I picked up a flounder in the same general area. We took a break for lunch and then went back out and picked up the trout and then the redfish. As soon as we had the red, we went to the jetties to try to get a tarpon for the super slam, but it was still a little rough, and the tarpon bite wasn't on... This weekend was some of the most fun fishing I've ever had! My brother, Keith, also caught a Grand Slam on 7/2. Check out the post below for the report on the incredible snook fishing!

LLM = Epic snook fishing!!!

This weekend was the best snook fishing I have ever had. We caught a total of 14 snook in 3 trips, and caught three over 30"!!! We also lost several more over 30". The fishing in the lower Laguna is amazing!! We caught snook in several different spots, and were in the right place at the right times to put a bait on their breakfast table. All 14 fish were caught on artifical lures, and all were released. Here's some shots of some of the memorable ones!

This one was my biggest, at over 32". I caught it on the first cast on sunday morning on a mascara colored Buster Jerk II. I was using 30lb braid with 60lb leader, so I was prepared for the big one and it happened on the first cast!

This is Rachel's 31". It hit a white Gulp 4" shrimp late in the day on saturday. Yes, she hooked it and caught it all on her own! I was very proud of this one!!!

This is Keith's 30"+. It hit a bunker colored Baby Buster right at the boat. We both saw this fish swirl and casted at it simultaneously. Keith had the mojo working on saturday morning and got the big bite. We caught 9 snook on saturday and Keith caught a Grand Slam.

Here's Dad's 25" he caught on a white Gulp 4" shrimp on Monday morning.

This is my father in law, Frank, with the fish that started it all!!!