Texas

Fishing in Texas

With its fantastic freshwater reservoirs and streams with stocks of largemouth and smallmouth bass, and catfish and well-stretched seacoasts with the superb red drum and spotted seatrout, Texas stands out as a remarkable fishing destination. Texas has 3,700 named streams and 15 major rivers, 212 reservoirs and hundreds of lakes. As the state’s population is growing, fishing in Texas is becoming more and more popular.

Top Fishing Spots

Texas can be divided into 7 regions, amongst which the coastal region supports saltwater fishery while the central, northeast, southeast, south, panhandle and west regions support freshwater fishery.

Trinity Bay

Coastal — Saltwater

North and South Sabine, Bolivar, Trinity Bay, East and West Galveston Bay, Texas City Dike, Freeport, East and West Matagorda Bay, Port O’Connor, Rockport, Port Aransas, Corpus Christi, Baffin Bay, Port Mansfield, South Padre and Port Isabel are filled with trout, redfish, flounder, black drum, sand trout, sheepshead, large gulf trout, and snook.

Central (Hill Country)

Austin, Brady Creek, Buchanan, Canyon, Georgetown, Granger, Inks, LBJ, Medina, Lady Bird (Town Lake), Travis and Walter E. Long are some major freshwater lakes in this region, supporting the fisheries of largemouth and smallmouth bass, white and stripped bass, white bass, hybrid stripped bass, sunfish, catfish, and crappie.

Northeast (Piney Woods)

This region holds enormous concentration of freshwater lakes like B.A. Steinhagen, Bob Sandlin, Brandy Branch, Caddo, Conroe, Fork, Dilmer, Gladewater City, Hawkins, Holbrook, Houston County, Jacksonville, Kurth, Lake O’the Pines, Livingston, Lone Star, Martin Creek, Monticello, Murvaul, Nacogdoches, Pinkston, Quitman, Raven, Sam Rayburn, Striker, Timpson, Toledo Bend, Tyler, Welsh, Winnsboro, and Wright Patman which have wide variety of species like largemouth bass, spotted bass, catfish, crappie, white bass, sunfish, chain pickerel, hybrid stripped bass, bluegill, blue and flathead catfish, and channel catfish.

Southeast (Prairies and Lakes)

This region to holds tremendous concentration of water bodies spread all over the state. Main of the water bodies include lakes of Alvarado Park, Amon G. Carter, Aquilla, Arlington, Bachman, Bardwell, Bastrop, Gibbons Creek, Marine Creek, Fayette County, Halbert, Eagle Mountain, Lewisville, Davy Crockett, Lavon, Mexia, Ray Hubbard, Purtis Creek State Park, Texoma, Cedar Creek, Benbrook, Granbury, Palestine, Waco, Wood and so on, which produce handsome catches of species like largemouth and spotted bass, smallmouth bass, blue catfish, channel catfish, flathead catfish, crappie, stripped bass, white bass, sunfish and so on.

South (South Texas Plains)

This region contains lakes like Findley (Alice City), Calaveras, Falcon, Choke Canyon, Braunig, Averhoff, and Casa Blanca, which gives handsome catch of species like largemouth bass, hybrid stripped bass, catfish, crappie, sunfish, channel catfish, white crappie, red drum, and blue and flathead catfish.

Mackenzie Lake, Panhandle

Panhandle (Panhandle Plains)

This is again a region rich with lakes like Buffalo Creek, Coleman, Graham, Arrowhead, Kickapoo, Millers Creek, Hubbard Creek, Daniel, Lost Creek, Mackenzie, White River, Oak Creek, Palo Pinto, Leon, Palo Duro, Fort Phantom Hill, Sweetwater, and J.B. Thomas, which hold a wide variety of fishes like largemouth bass, blue catfish, flathead catfish, crappie, hybrid stripped bass, white bass, sunfish, and so on.

West (Big Bend Country)

This region has lakes like Amistad, Balmorhea and Red Bluff which has fishes like largemouth bass, smallmouth bass, channel and blue catfish, white and stripped bass, and white crappie.

Texas Rivers

Texan rivers meander through 191,000 miles of Texas land providing recreational fishing opportunities to millions. While in summer when the lake fishing becomes slow, Texas rivers provide constant fishing throughout the year. However river being a natural resource, can be dangerous, therefore better check the skill lever of yourself and everybody in your river party before planning river fishing. Neches, Angelina, Red, Sabine, San Jacinto, Trinity, and Sulphur are some of the major rivers in the east Texas, while Blanco, Colorado, Leon, Lavaca and Wichita are some rivers of central Texas and west Texas has rivers like Devils, Pecos and Grande. The Neches River is known to produce over 50 pounds of flathead catfish.

Tackle

You can best lure blue and channel catfish with cut bait, while flathead catfish prefer live bait. Largemouth bass is very active when the water is cooler, when crankbaits and spinnerbaits work well around vegetation to catch them. During summer, when the fish is active in early morning and late evening, poppers, flukes and propeller baits work best for top water baits for low light conditions. And when sun rises and the fish take shelter in weeds, plastic worms work best. Crappie are caught mostly in shallow water during the spring on jigs and minnows, while sunfish, especially bluegill and redear sunfish, is caught year-round, but late spring and summer are the peak seasons when fish are on the spawning beds and small jigs, crickets and spinners all work well to catch them.

As you can see clearly the state of Texas is full of fishing opportunities and so you will be definitely tempted to plan a venture for fishing in Texas this vacation!