Posted: Sun, 28 Jun 2009 08:18 AM - 8,161 Readers
By: Ray Austin
Catching fish in a barrel. Welcome to another week of Anglin’ with Austin. I hope everyone had a great Fathers Day this past weekend.
Who’s entitled to the water?
As most of you know, the Guadalupe feeds Canyon Lake and bleeds it at the same time.
The alarming rate that some of you may not know is that it is now feeding in about five cubic feet per second and leaving via the outflow on the dam at around 60 cubic feet per second.
The Blanco River Authority entered into an agreement that states that they must lower the lake in order to keep the lower Guadalupe fed with water for downstream users, yeah not real sure what that is about. Blanco River Authority controlling the Guadalupe river…don't get me to guessing there.
I’m going to go on record as saying, “Lets get them building some boat ramps so that we can go with the water”. Makes sense to me.
Why are the toobers getting the anglers water?? I can’t eat a toob the last time I checked.
I can see us tooling around with the toobers on the lower Guadalupe. The only problem I see with that is getting the rubber toobs out of your prop…not pretty at all.
The only thing you’ll need at Canyon Lake in August is a cane pole, hiking boots, four-wheel drive, just kidding its not that bad yet, capacity is currently around 74 percent, so no worries anytime soon.
Here come the dry months
This has nothing to do with any one entity, it's a lack of rain. We’re entering into the dry months and we’re way behind on the Canyon Lake levels — almost 14 feet low at this point — and fishing is still excellent and boats are coming in and out of ramps just fine.
Be careful around points and exposed timber areas in the lake.
It could be worse, Lake Meredith is only 70…yes 70 feet low.
Lake Spence is 57 feet under sea level. Both lakes are in Texas and their fishing reports probably read like this: Every type of fish is excellent on your hands in six inches of water. Our fishing is still great at Canyon Lake and there are several ramps to get you in and out of the lake just fine.
Dunlap and Placid are busy with water sports enthusiasts, but fishing is good if you can patiently brave the waves. We need a rain dance from everyone that reads this column.
We could have a lot of visitors over the Fourth of July weekend.
Lake Travis in Austin is down to two ramps and it is predicted by LCRA to be down to only one entry point over the holiday weekend…Ouch!
Buchanan is down to one ramp , so make room for our neighbors to come fishing. Does anyone have a sign about 50 feet long that says, “We’re Closed”?
Better yet, I will send last weeks column about the gator to their chamber of commerce and perhaps add a zero to the measurements, photoshop the picture to increase the gators size, and write, “released mid-lake” instead of, “upriver”. We’d be fishing by ourselves in no time.
Fishing conditions
Fishing shallow is where its at now. Catching bass, catfish, crappie in 10 feet of water is not uncommon until around October or November. Fishing baits should be thrown into shallow water or corked up. Topwater lures and lighter weighted soft plastics are seen being thrown all over the area…that time of year is finally here again.
Night fishing is a great way to beat the summer heat.
Take the kids out on a Friday or Saturday night and drop punch bait on a treble hook, a minnow on an Aberdeen 2⁄0 hook, live perch on a 8⁄0 circle hook and catch some crappie, catfish, and white bass.
Fish are becoming more active as the temperatures cool down in the evenings and the baitfish get to moving around.
Daylight fishing will be confined to the early and late hours of the day when the sun is tucking behind the beautiful hills around Canyon Lake. If the wind lays during the day this will also make the fishing a little tough in the middle of the day. Fish do not like direct sunlight and the wind breaks the direct sunlight up enough to let the fish feel secure enough to move around and feed.
The last of the fish that are late spawners are moving around and hungry now. Go to my website www.TopCatFishing.net and pull up the attractors that were put in over the last five years. The baitfish should be huddled around the man-made underwater structures with the bigger fish chasing them around.
If you find shad topping the water there is some type of game fish chasing them and usually the catfish are right under the circus waiting for the injured shad to swim down to their level. Kind of a buffet of game fish to be had if you can find topping shad during the summer months. Go get ‘em.
I spoke with a couple of fly fishing anglers this week on Dunlap and they’re having some luck on the smallmouth and largemouth bass in the lower Guadalupe river and around the dam between the river and Dunlap. They also said they were landing some big slab perch with their flies.
Tournament results
Tournament results for the first annual Rudy Kirchhoff Memorial Bass Tournament.
First place — 17 pounds Phillip and Avery Walker - $1,000, great sack
Second place — 10.1 pounds Charles Whited and Jeffrey Peels - $500
Third place — 81⁄2 pounds Saul and Jamie (forgot last names... OOPS) — $250
Big Bass — 6 pounds Phillip Walker - $120
Total of 24 bass weighed for 48.35 pounds
It was a well organized tournament by Travis Smith of the Canyon Tackle Box with a big helping hand from the Guadalupe Bass Club.
This club runs a working man tournament at Canyon Lake every Wednesday from 5-8:45p.m. at Jacobs Creek Park. What a great bunch of anglers and nice sacks to boot.
The fish fry afterwards was a blast and got to meet some great people and share a lot of laughs and good food.
Special thanks to all of the local businesses that donated money, goods, property usage for prostate cancer research.
Best times to fish this week are from 6-9 a.m. and again from 6-9:30 p.m..
BURN BAN IS BACK IN EFFECT, NO OUTDOOR BURNING!
Lake conditions
Canyon Lake — 13 feet low — Largemouth Bass excellent on crankbaits, spinners, soft watermelon colored plastics in 1-10 feet of water along points and timber.
Smallmouth Bass are good on spinners and soft plastic senkos; White Bass and Striper slow; Crappie are excellent around timber in river channel at night 4-10 feet; Blue catfish good on cut shad and Big Marvs punch bait.
Channel cat excellent on rocks with Danny Kings blood and Big Marvs punch bait; yellow cat slow and should be starting their spawn soon.
Lake Dunlap and Placid — Largemouth Bass good on crankbaits, 7-inch red shad plastic worms, watermelon lizards. Blue catfish and channel cat fair on punch bait; Yellow cat are slow; Big slab perch and some crappie caught on small jigs in 2-6 feet of water.
Tip of the Week
Being the catfishing type, I like to be prepared for the big one to hit at anytime.
I use a medium-heavy to heavy action rod when fishing for cats. I’m now changing this up when I’m taking customers on a crappie trip, especially when kids are involved.
Get a light action rod for the predominately smaller sized fish like perch and crappie. This will bring the whole fight part of fishing back into perspective for you and make it a whole lot more challenging and fun for everyone involved.
