Striped Bass (striper) caught by Larry Hodge fishing in Calaveras Lake in Texas on 03/03/08

Posted by Larry Hodge over 13 years ago

Central Texas anglers live right in the middle of some of the best fishing Texas has to offer, a fact illustrated by a recent trip on Calaveras Lake with guide Manny Martinez.
Putting in at the recently renovated public park on the east side of the lake, we motor across to the dam. There Martinez (210/386-6695) ties up to a row of orange buoys. Rods are already rigged with 3/8-ounce silver slabs, and Martinez begins heaving lures as near as he can to the base of the dam, handing off rods to me and my fishing companions—Ron Strait, Zoe Ann Stinchcomb, John Dennis and Kristy Kollaus.
“The hybrid stripers hold close to the wall,” he says. “Count 15 seconds, then begin a slow retrieve.” Usually two or three cranks of the reel later, a fish slams the slab and the fight is on. Failure to wait the required 15 seconds practically guarantees no bite, although a few times fish follow the bait halfway to the boat before biting.
Dennis, who is a fisheries biologist with TPWD, estimates the four- to six-pound fish are three to four years old. TPWD stocked 756,506 fish into Calaveras from 2004 through 2007, and there are plenty of fish that size in the lake. We’re amazed at how many fish the same size we catch, but Dennis says that’s not unusual. “Fish of the same size tend to hang out together,” he says. “In a world where bigger fish eat smaller fish, it makes sense.”
Calaveras is right on the edge of San Antonio and is surrounded by a public park with camping, picnic areas, fish clean station, boat ramp and store. Well-kept, the park underwent extensive upgrades in 2007 courtesy of the San Antonio River Authority. TPWD manages fishing in the reservoir, which provides cooling water for a power plant.
“We stock hybrids into the lake every year and redfish almost every year,” Dennis says. “It’s a put, grow and take fishery. We stock hybrid stripers instead of stripers, because hybrids can survive a wider range of temperatures. Power plant lakes get too hot in the summertime for stripers. Even so, the key to finding stripers in summer is to look for the coolest water, which is also generally the deepest.” That explains why the fish like to hang out at the base of the dam in summer—and also why you must let the lure fall a long time before beginning to reel.