A good time to fish in Canyon Lake

I called Tom Ray, my next-door neighbor and fishing pal, and said, “Thanksgiving is behind us. Do you know what that means?”

“No,” he replied.

“It’s time to chase schooling striped bass on Canyon Lake,” I said

Beginning about December hungry striped bass begin to explode into schools of shad on the surface, especially in the upper part of the lake near the dam. Often white bass are mixed in the schools.

Chasing surface feeding fish is called “jump fishing” by McClane’s in his New Standard Fishing

Encyclopedia. It’s a rather accurate description.

Tom and his son, Chris, and I launched my 16 foot skiff at the Potter’s Creek ramp. That positioned Us about mid-lake so we could run either direction looking for schooling fish. It was our first striper expedition of the season and we were excited.

We motored north toward the dam but it didn’t take long before Chris shouted, “There they are.” Near the shore just short of Canyon Park Cove we saw shad flying out of the water and seagulls diving into the melee.

Chris cast his white soft plastic swim bait in the school and hooked a good striper. Tom missed one on his topwater spook. Then the fish disappeared into the deep.

Watching the fish finder we moved from 14-foot water, down a drop into a 34-foot channel.

Now trolling deep baits — primarily small gigs trolled far behind the boat — we found the fish again. My rod doubled over as a nice striper ate my chartreuse-white crappie jig. A long fight on light tackle commenced. Stripers are powerful fish. They are long and built for speed. Patience is required to boat one on the small crappie jigs. Too much pressure and they can straighten the small hooks. But my 4-pound fish finally joined Chris’ fish in the ice box.

Time to move on toward the dam, hopefully to find more fish. In the wide mouth of Tom’s Creek on the north side of the lake, we saw a big school of fish on the surface. Then things got wild.

Chris immediately caught a nice white bass. Tom hooked a good striper on his topwater. As I moved through to the schooling area on the electric trolling motor, I trolled a jig with my foot on the rod handle as I cast a Pop-R topwater.

Chris and Tom were both fighting good stripers when the rod under my foot doubled around the troll motor. Several long runs followed before he came to the net. When the surface action slowed down we continued to troll, even though the fish finder showed 84-feet deep.

I continued to cast my Pop-R while we trolled. Suddenly, even though no fish were visible on the surface, a big striper tried to maul my topwater. Top water fishing is so fun. All the senses are involved — sight, sound, feel. To me it is the ultimate in fishing. The big fish tried to go deep but the treble hooks held and he joined the others in the icebox that was rapidly filling up.

Most of the stripers that we landed were between 4- and 5-pounds. Some are much larger in Canyon Lake but this size seems to be the average.

Expect this striper-surface fishing to even get better from Christmas on into March as the fish move closer to the river. Last year, Tom and I found a good school of stripers on the fish finder in the mouth of the river.

We often catch a few stripers in the river in February and March while fishing for white bass.

They are up the river to spawn but no documented successful spawn has happened. Therefore, all the stripers in Canyon have been stocked by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. Fingerling stripers are stocked each year. It has worked well. Stripers are ferocious eaters and grow fast.

Now is the time to try for them. A fish finder is a big help but you can still catch some with a sharp eye for diving seagulls and thrashing fish.