Oklahoma Fisherman Lands One of the 20 Biggest Bass in Texas History

On March 31, Oklahoma fishing buddies Cullie Beveal and Jonathan Excessive made the six-hour drive to O.H. Ivie Lake east of San Angelo, Texas. That they had booked a two-day journey with Kyle Corridor, and their expectations had been excessive. A famous bass information and match fisherman, Corridor is one just a few native anglers who has helped construct O.H. Ivie’s repute lately as one of the top trophy largemouth lakes within the South.

“I fished the lake with Kyle final yr and caught my finest bass, weighing 10.5 kilos,” Beveal tells Out of doors Life. “My aim this yr was to catch a bass larger than that one.”

The 2 Sooner State anglers hit the water with Corridor early on April 1. However powerful circumstances made the motion gradual.

“It was brutal, with winds to 40 mph, making our fishing actually troublesome,” says Beveal, 26. “We used ‘LiveScope’ to seek for huge bedding bass in 6 to eight toes of water. We discovered some bass however [they] weren’t .”

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The next morning, April 2, the wind was nonetheless blowing, however the anglers had been decided to maintain attempting to find huge fish utilizing Corridor’s forward-facing sonar. They discovered one bass on a nest that Corridor believed was about 8-pounds. However the fish wouldn’t chew.

Simply after midday, they situated one other, larger bass on the FFS. Beveal forged a swim bait to the fish — he was utilizing a 6th Sense Panorama 6.5 within the bluegill shade. His first forged was off the mark a bit, so he reeled in and made a second forged to the fish that was now simply 15 toes from their boat.

His second forged landed simply past the bass. He labored his bait towards the largemouth and let it sink.

“I noticed the lure on sonar land close to the mattress,” Beveal explains. “The fish was agitated and went nostril down towards the lure. I knew the bass was going to take the swimbait, and a second later I set the hook into what felt like a brick wall.”

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Beveal couldn’t imagine the facility of the bass at first. It was a unique form of pull, and Corridor yelled for him to struggle the fish more durable. Beveal labored it in shortly towards Corridor’s touchdown internet.

“Kyle netted the fish and put it on the deck. And none of us mentioned something for just a few seconds … We had been in awe.”

Corridor pulled out the digital hand scale he had, which confirmed a weight of greater than 16 kilos.

“I informed Kyle and Jonathan, ‘No method.’ There was simply no probability of that fish weighing that a lot,” says Beveal. “We put the fish within the stay effectively, after which we headed to Elm Creek Marina the place we launched that morning as a result of that they had an authorized scale.”

At Elm Creek the egg-laden feminine bass formally weighed 16.39 kilos. It measured 27.75 inches lengthy, with an enormous, 22-inch girth. It’s the 20^th largest bass ever caught in Texas, in keeping with Texas Parks and Wildlife, and the most important weighed this yr by state fisheries biologists.

Kyle made a name to TPWD straight away to inform them concerning the bass they’d caught.

“The state’s Legacy ShareLunker program for the spring spawn had simply ended, and Kyle needed to know in the event that they nonetheless needed the fish for his or her stocking program,” Beveal saus. “They mentioned, ‘Completely,’ they usually had a crew there with a transport tank to take the fish in simply half-hour.”

Beveal’s bass is now in a big aquarium on the Texas Freshwater Fisheries Heart in Athens. Spawn from the fish might be used within the state’s ShareLunker Program, a remarkably efficient breeding and stocking program the place anglers can submit trophy bass to TPWD in the course of the early spring. These bass are then spawned within the Fisheries Heart, and their progeny launched into O.H. Ivie and different Texas lakes.

“My bass was very alive and wholesome after we gave to the state people,” Beveal mentioned. “I’ll have a duplicate mount manufactured from the bass to at all times keep in mind that fishing day. I’m simply glad I didn’t catch it the day earlier than, which was April Idiot’s Day. Nobody ever would have believed me.”