Texas open for fishing business year-round

Published 5:52 pm Wednesday, April 27, 2016

Picture this if you can. It is this morning April 28, and boats, trailers and trucks are lined up at ramps from Lake Meredith in the Panhandle to Lake Mathis near Corpus Christi, and from Caddo Lake to Amistad.

Why? Well, it is opening day of bass fishing season.

After a winter’s hibernation fishermen finally have a chance to get back on the water with their $60,000 boats and thousands of dollars in gear that have been in storage since the season closed last winter. It is a party not unlike the opening day of deer season.

OK, for Texas fishermen this would be more nightmare. Can you imagine the anarchy that would come with fishing seasons with openings and closings like deer, quail or dove hunting? Sure you can try to make a person a deer hunter from October to January, but anything less than a 12-month fisherman, well that would qualify as no longer preaching and gone to meddling.

While fishing is a year-round lifestyle in the South, the truth is state after state across the northern tier of the United States are just getting around to opening their fishing seasons. Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, New York, Washington and others have a start-stop point, something as odd to Texans as a boat with a trolling motor on the stern of a boat. There are seasons for a variety of fish including bass, trout, walleye and musky.

“Opening day, it was interesting,” said Dave Terre, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department’s Inland Fisheries Management/Research Chief, a Wisconsin native who grew up with the fishing season concept. “People would look forward to opening day. It was exciting. You would gear up for it like the opening of squirrel or deer season.”

However, there was also confusing because some years the river or lake ice would thaw early allowing people to fish, but they were not able to keep their catch because it was outside the season dates.

The divide between the north and the south and season restrictions is actually pretty easy to explain. It has to do with our winter being more like their spring. Before fisheries management became the science it is today, protection of spawning stock in the north came primarily by keeping the fish off-limits until they had time to be on the nest.

Terre said in many states that theory has been disproven in recent years, and while there is movement away from season openers it can come slowly.

“People have it in their mind they are doing something when they are really not,” he said.

Think not shooting does in Texas as a comparison.

Surprisingly there have been calls in Texas from time to time to close bass fishing during the spawn, and if not fishing completely at least portions of lakes that could serve as nesting refuges and nurseries.

“Fish don’t need to be protected in Texas. There is plenty of natural reproduction. Plenty of successful spawning going on,” Terre said.

In a state that from north to south covers almost half the depth of the country, Texas has a bass spawn that can begin in December in South Texas and possibly last until June in the Panhandle.

On individual lakes that can run the gamut of 27,000 acres at Fork to 84,000 acres at Falcon, bass spawning activity can go on for months, providing natural protection to the population.

And while the season-opening festivities continue in some states, Terre sees them slowing fading away. As is often the case sociology trails biology, but as younger, more progressive fishermen come into the fold so will the demand for more fishing.

Don’t underestimate the power of the dollar either.

“For some from cities and towns it is limiting economics. The seasons are in place and they are limiting some tournaments or tourism dollars. You can’t go up there and fish because you can’t keep the fish,” Terre explained.

Going forward the biologist believes science will eventually displace tradition.

“They are becoming more and more progressive with their science. Fisheries science is being used to guide these species more and more,” Terre said.

Have a comment or opinion on this story? Contact outdoor writer Steve Knight by email at outdoor@tylerpaper.com. Follow Steve Knight on Facebook at Texas All Outdoors and on Twitter @txalloutdoors.