Reservation Number : 26856
Property Name : Hickory Creek Ranch Lakes
Reservation Date : 01/03/2021 All Day -
Total Fish/Sizes : 39
Lures Used : plastics, Crankbait

John Shepard and I arrived at the beautiful Hickory Creek property about 7:30 AM Sunday morning. We noticed two things right away, first a huge herd of deer grazing in the pasture on the left side as your approach the tank (what an awesome site) and second the water level was up to less than a foot from the bottom of the fishing dock from all the recent rains. You could tell from the bank the water level was higher than normal. We stopped at the bridge and fished for a few minutes and I was rewarded with a 19.5 inch bass for my first fish of 2021. John had a couple strikes on a swim bait but no commits. Air temperature was mid-to upper 30's but the wind was light so it was not too bad. We decided to go to the pier and cast before rigging the club boat out for the day. John caught a 2 lber first cast but that was it so we rigged the boat out with trolling motor and gear. 

We started on the dam looking for any kind of activity and spotted some chasing in the corner on the dam so we threw sq bills and drop shot catching 4 or 5 12-16 inchers right away but it did not last long. By now the wind is starting to pick up so we started moving around down the bank across for the pier with no luck. We anchored up on the lake side of the island and stated catching fish pretty regular. We circled the island  a couple of times catching fish each time we did. That was probably the most productive area we fished for the day.

We ended the day catching 39 very fat healthy bass culling 7. I have been going to this tank since it was first offered to the club and the size and quality of the fish have improved a lot since our first trip so the culling is working.

Note; we did make it to back to the small tank in the back of the property and found the water to be very muddy so we decided not to stay and went back to the big tank.