Striking Striper on Denison Dam
It has been long enough since I had some kind of luck – ZERO SKILL – catching striper below Denison Dam, on the Oklahoma and Texas Border.
But once the YouTube shorts started arriving in my text messages, and I saw that phenomenal fish stacked up like aquarium fish up against the Dam? I knew it was time to try again.
In general, it takes a couple of things to happen in harmony – for there to be a new deposit of striper below the Denison Dam. My guess, since we have not been dealing with biblical floods there recently, is that a general generation release caught some striper sleeping near the intake. They went on a ride that they never imagined, through the gate and down below.
That is only the beginning though. They then faced an onslaught of lead and lure – in plain sight of the casters above. The slaughter repeats itself once again, with the help of a very active community of folks sworn to keep/sell every striper they can catch. Merciless are they.
For my part, on this day, it was a few dinks right at sunup, and nothing more. Apparently the generation is running at night, starting around 6pm. For me that is the “right time” the time when the dinner horn rings and the trained striper (BIG) come out to get a quick bite. I love the start of generation because it has been so successful for me in the past.
Word of Wisdom
An old guy – walking some little pink-skinned dogs – who must be living very near (I was on the Oklahoma side), pointed out the heat that came pretty soon after the sun came up. And he said, “…once it cools down, they’ll be more active again,” and that fits with my experience that day – they were UP, and then they were DOWN once the heat kicked in. They are striper after all!
It was good to see the ODWC officials working the Oklahoma side before daylight, while there was no one to work on the Texas side until about three hours after sunup. No Body. The situation was anything but “COMBAT” fishing this time, and I am left to wonder exactly why? It could be crowded on the generations at about 6, but I wonder if it is?
END NOTE: This is the first official fly fishing outing for the Insta X5 camera, and it was mind blowing. Let me know how you like or DON’T like the video – because it plays VERY different from anything I have done in the past!
