I haven't gotten my St. Croix Imperial 7090 XXL wet this year, so I dusted it off last night and attached the MG3 reel for an early jump to a river. The Texas Hill Country is well below average for rainfall this year so our spring fed rivers are suffering. We’ve gotten some rain the past week or so, so I decided to take advantage and hit up the Medina River this morning.
My dog is wondering if he gets to go at 4:30 am. (He did not)
I left alittle before 5:00 am to get a jump on the day. Our forecast high was going to be over 100℉, so I wanted to be on and off early. Made the 1.5 hour drive, got my gear together and was fishing by 6:45 am.
I hit up a new stretch of the Medina, Benton Crossing. First fish of the day was a Warmouth (rock bass); my first one in a couple years.
Continued up stream and caught a good variety of sunfish and bass, spot and Guads.
Chunky Guad
I ended up wading only ½ mile or so up river. But I did catch a nce 13” ish bass; put a nice bend in the fly rod.
A really pretty stretch and well worth exploring some more in the future.
Deer Skull
I pulled off the water around 9:00 am to head to a second spot to target Rio Grande Cichlids, one of my favorite species to target. Just downstream I pulled into Moffett Park and began wading down stream.
I tried for almost an hour straight to catch a cichlid, and I had a couple hooked up, but never got one to hand. They were plentiful, but I just couldn’t make it happen today. Still, the sunfish were super aggressive still.
Nice Waterfall.
I was off the river by 11:15 for the quick drive back home. A good, quick outing with a great variety of species. I had shots and nearly every variety of sunfish found in Texas, cichlids, three species of bass, catfish and even carp. These are two great wade fishing stretches.
Shoot, I was off early enough to have time to fire up the pit and start smoking half a turkey breast and legs for dinner.