Reservation Number : 31345
Property Name : Deer Trail Ranch
Reservation Date : 03/29/2022 All Day -
Total Fish/Sizes : 90+ Fish/1 over 4lb, 3 over 3lb, most around 2-2.5lb
Lures Used : 3.8 or 4.3 Paddletail on a 3/0 Flashy Swimmer, Weighted wacky stick bait

This is a fishing story, but let’s start at the beginning.  As the date drew closer and closer, the weather forecast situation got more worrisome.  By the night before, the forecast called for such windy conditions that I considered cancelling and rescheduling (especially because I was bringing a guest who’s never fished with me before).  But my last trip out (Frannie’s) was also very windy, and it turned out to be a really good day, so I figured we’d give it a shot.  Next, on the way to Sulphur Bluff my friend notices that my TPMS light comes on (tire pressure), and so as I’m keeping an eye on it, the pressure just keeps going down.  So long story short, 2 stops, 1 can of fix a flat, a big cut near the sidewall, a changed tire, and a trip to Sulphur Springs to get the spare aired up enough, and we have burned almost 1.5 hours of fishing time.  Not the start I was hoping for...But that was about to change.

We finally launched the boat close to 9am and since the wind wasn’t howling (yet) we decided to fish the southern end and then make our way down the eastern shoreline.  We started catching fish immediately.  I was using a 3.8 Rage Swimmer (Electric Shad color) on a 3/0 Owner Flashy Swimmer hook.  My partner was using a 1/8th oz wacky rigged stick bait in green pumpkin.  After my bites continued and his had slowed, I offered to set him up with the same lure I was using until that bite played out.  Once he got on the swimbait, he started catching again.  We spent at least 1 hour in that shallow end south of the boat ramp catching fish after fish, and of course missing a few bites along the way.  The wind started to pick up after 10am, and we did end up making our way down the eastern shore, but we never quit catching them!  Every place we drifted to or motored back up to as we drifted past, there were more fish.  By around 12:45 or so, we decided to pull in for a lunch break and we hadn’t even covered half of that shoreline.  We had around 36 fish landed by this point and a bunch more that got off before being landed.  I could keep on going with how insane the fishing was (especially since the weatherman was right and the wind was howling all afternoon), but let me sum it all up this way:

Besides the 2-3 fish caught on that wacky worm in the morning, every fish (between 90-100) came on the swimbait. (BTW this was the same bait that killed at Frannie’s last week)

Most of the fish were between 1.5 and 2.5lbs, but were chunky and fought harder than their weight (only 2 dinks).  Most of the fish were so consistent, that we joked we were just making copies of the same fish or catching the same 5 over and over.

Not a day for the big ones.  We caught 4 that were over 3lbs with the largest being 4.5lbs.  

They were definitely shallow as we caught just about all in 7 FOW or less

We did not even attempt to fish along the dam area as there were literal breakers hitting that shore, so we bypassed it and fished the western shore back toward the ramp.

Finally, conditions.  Upper 60’s to mid 70’s with high winds (of course) 15-20mph with higher gusts starting around 10:30am.  Full cloudy skies (never saw the sun till after 6pm).  Water was stained green with about 24 inches visibility.  Water temp started 62 degrees and got up to 65 degrees