Lake Texoma is experiencing low water levels not seen since Jimmy Carter was in the White House.

October is normally a great month in these parts.

The first flashes of color on the Creator’s canvas.

Cool nights, mild days.

Waterfowl, shorebirds, and Monarch butterflies migrating south through North Texas.

And some great fly fishing action for Texoma striped bass.

But this year isn’t normal, far from it in fact.

Why? Newsflash: Texas is experiencing a major drought.

If you didn’t know that already, the current dry spell is the worst since the mid-1950s.

And that was a Lulu.

So is the current dust bowl, leaving the Lone Star State parched, burning, and left for dead.

Speaking of left for dead, that’s the status of the home water these days, the used-to-be 89,000-acre Lake Texoma, now at its lowest level since Carter was prez.

609.95 is the current level, 617.00 is the normal level.

Throw in a blue-green algae outbreak over the past month (Note: fishing and boating are still open but the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is prohibiting contact with the water) and I’ve got a serious case of the blues.

Of the want to go kayaking and fly fishing blues.

But that ain’t going to happen anytime soon.

The latest tests from Uncle Sam say that the algae levels remain at warning levels. More cooler weather and rain – something that isn’t in the forecast – are needed to reduce the algae bloom and bring the toxin levels back to safe levels.

That all but puts off any kayak fishing plans I might have.

Now if you have a boat, all is good on Texoma. (Full disclosure: I don’t have a boat though I am always in the market for one. The wife and yours truly are negotiating a boat deal as we speak. No final deal as of yet, but we’re making progress since we’re only about $40,000 apart!).

Aside from the difficulty of launching a rig at some boat ramps, for those fortunate souls who do get on the water, Texoma is the big empty these days, all but devoid of any traffic these days.

And the stripers are still there by the gazillions. While it is commonly known that Texoma is perhaps the nation’s best sweetwater spot for catching a linesider, the current fishing is nearly epic.

Seriously.

In fact, one local guide complained on the Texas Fishing Forum a day or two ago about having a “sore arm” from catching dozens of striped bass at Texoma. Another boasted of an 82-fish day this week.

And their reports are the norm right now for those who can get on the water.

Amazingly enough, despite a horrid summer of triple digit heat and dry weather that produced lake temps in the mid-90s late this summer, Texoma’s famous striped bass population is in robust shape.

They have been chowing on shad all year-long and are fat, happy, and tough to land. Especially on an eight-weight Temple Fork fly rod.

Maybe one day I’ll remember what that feels like, a striper trying to expose the backing on my Orvis fly reel.

In the meantime, I try in vain to shake a serious case of the Texoma striper blues.

Algae, drought, and otherwise.

For some reason, casting flies to these golden brown figures ghosting around the flats of local lakes never really appealed to me.

And then came a fateful day on a local reservoir when the largemouth bass refused to cooperate.

That’s when I noticed the dozens of tails popping up all over the place.

For just a moment, I thought I might be wading on a South Texas redfish flat, not a North Texas rez filled with ditch puppies.

After swallowing my bass junkie’s pride just a little bit, I decided to go gonzo and cast a fly or two in their direction.

A half hour of refusals later, I was still going hard at it, flinging a black wooly bugger with an orange conehead in the direction of any and all carp I could find.

Then I finally hooked one. Felt the sudden jolt of a fish. And saw the fly line delicously evaporating off my reel.

And gained a new found rush in my ongoing pursuit to cast flies to Texas’ various warmwater fish.

Welcome to the dark side Mr. Skywalker.

Fast forward a few weeks – now I’m tying up carp flies and seeking out places where these strange looking critters feed.

Ok, so maybe they aren’t bonefish on a Bahamian flat. Or redfish in the Lower Laguna Madre.

But they are plentiful in my neck of the woods. And they seem challenging to catch. And I’m putting back into action some South Texas flats fishing lessons that have remained dormant for several years.

The dark side of fly fishing indeed.

I just might grow to like this carpin’ on the fly.

Maybe and we’ll see.

So with all of that in mind, enjoy today’s “Monday Movie,” an inner city carp adventure filmed by the pike-man himself, Barry Reynolds Fly Fishing.

Carp on brother!

Kayaking around, I began to wonder about what to do. That’s when I start to see these aliens feeding all over the place.

Catching a carp on the fly...crossing over to the dark side of fly fishing!

So I rummage around in the fly boxes and come up with a black Wooly Bugger with an orange conehead.

A Rob Woodruff East Texas chain pickerel special.

Will it work on carpe diem?

Only one way to find out.
An hour of fruitless casts later, I finally hear the Darth Vader voice “Luke, come to the dark side.”

Fish on!

My first Ray Bob carp on the fly! After a bulldog like tussle, slid this fish in and took a picture.

Then I went back to the dark side and tried to do it again. Missed a couple of more, actually took it from them on the hook set.

Now this is not something I’d want to do everyday (big bass on the fly, big bass on the fly, and more big bass on the fly please!) but it was a fun change of pace.

By the way, for all of the talk of this being a “Freshwater Bonefish,” no serious testing of the drag was involved on catching this guy. Instead, the fight reminded me of a Texas redfish on the coast.

One more thing: North Texas’ Ray Roberts must be the king of carp fishing.

They are EVERYWHERE on that lake.

D-Vader, on second thought, maybe the dark side of Texas fly fishing doesn’t look so bad.

Produced by award-winning Spirit River Studios, this film featuring members of the Salmonfly Syndicate group shows that things come in BIG packages out West.

BIG water – as in the Deschutes.

BIG bugs – as in the Pteronarcys californica, a.k.a. the Salmon Fly.

And BIG ‘bows – as in the beautiful rainbow trout that live all year for the annual salmon fly hatch smackdown on the ‘Chutes.

All in all, a totally cool “Monday Movie” offering for the heat of late summer.

So sit back, chill out, and enjoy a cold beverage.

And as one of the anglers says late in this piece, “Oh yeah!”

As in “Oh yeah!,” pay extra close attention to the action around the 2:50 mark of this short flick.

You’ll see what I mean.

Oklahoma may be better known for its college football prowess, but guide Rob Woodruff shows that it is also a great spot to catch a summertime rainbow. The plump 'bow above was caught from the tailrace of the Lower Mountain Fork River near Broken Bow.

But they should be looking at him like he’s E.F. Hutton.

Because when it comes to catching Texoma linesiders on the fly, there are few better than Hollensed.

Orvis guide Rob Woodruff shows off a Texoma striper caught on a topwater popper while fishing with guide Steve Hollensed.

I found that out when Hollensed took me on a scouting tour of Texoma a few days ago with eight-weight Orvis Helios fly rods in our hands.

We did so well that by 8 a.m. we had already lost count as to how many stripers we had caught on Hollensed’s hand tied poppers anchored atop #2 Gamakatsu stinger hooks.

And since then, the fly fishing action on the 89,000-acre reservoir has only gotten better.

Take a trip last week with a client from Houston and another from Kansas.

“It was a heck of a day,” Hollensed said. “Between the two of them, they caught five fish that weighed between nine and 11-pounds.”

Mind you, Hollensed (www.flywaterangling.com; (903) 546-6237) carries a Boga Grip on each trip so those weights are legit.

“These guys were saying that this was one of the best fishing days they had ever had,” he said. “The fish were slamming the flies so hard that they were almost hooking themselves and then they were quickly tearing into the backing on the fly reel.

“Then the guys would work them back up to the boat but when the fish saw it, they would sound and make some more hard runs.

“It was definitely a big striper day that they won’t soon forget.”

Ditto for the trip that Hollensed guided for two different anglers today. By the time this particular outing was over, more than two dozen quality fish had been landed including a couple weighing better than 10-pounds.

What’s really amazing about all of this is the manner in which all of these big stripers are being caught – on full sinking fly lines.

Sinking lines?

Yep.

When most people think of fly fishing, they typically think of weight forward floating lines like those used to present a dry fly to trout or a deer hair popper to a bass.

But Hollensed says that the use of weighted fly lines – some which sink as fast as nine-inches per second – can actually help an angler catch fish through the entire water column to depths upwards of 50 feet.

Hollensed and his clients are landing plenty of double-digit Texoma stripers this summer on the Orvis Depth Charge sinking line.

“Fishing a sinking line improves your versatility, which also improves your chances for catching bigger fish,” said the Federation of Fly Fishers master casting instructor.

“A case in point was (that trip last week). These guys had never fished sinking lines before but before they were through they were catching big fish in 25 to 30 feet of water.”

Ditto for his trip earlier today. After a sluggish topwater bite, a short crash course with his clients on how to fish sinking lines commenced and the game was soon on.

So exactly what type of fly rod set-up does this take?

“It takes a good eight or nine-weight fly rod with a 300-grain to a 400-grain sinking line loaded up onto a lightweight large arbor fly reel,” Hollensed said. “A good example of that is the Orvis Depth Charge line loaded onto a lightweight large arbor Battenkill reel.”

To that fly line Hollensed ties a four to eight-foot long straight leader made of Berkley Trilene Big Game monofilament in green tint and 17-pound test.

As for flies, he recommends anything that mimics a threadfin or gizzard shad. Such selections include a wide assortment of Clouser Minnows, Lefty’s Deceivers, and Hollensed’s own Crystal Shad all in white, chartreuse, and pearlescent blue colors tied on #1, 1/0, and 2/0 size hooks.

If such a set-up sounds difficult to cast, Hollensed says that it isn’t. In fact, he has found that once people get used to casting a shooting head sinking line like the Depth Charge, they oftentimes prefer casting it over a floating fly line.

But as my recent outing with the guide showed, topwater poppers are often exactly what Texoma stripers are wanting to hit on that particular summer day.

Be forewarned however.

“When a big 10-pound striper slams a popper, you just better hope that your heart is in good condition,” Hollensed laughed.

For a topwater set-up Hollensed recommends a six, seven, or eight-weight fly rod; a lightweight large arbor reel; and a line like the Orvis Freshwater Bass line which is a floating line with an aggressive front taper that turns over big poppers with relative ease.

To that fly line he will then tie a 7 ½ or 9-foot Orvis Super Strong abrasion resistant leader (in a bass/pike taper) in either 16 or 20-pound test.

Hollensed says that at the end of the day he never feels that he or his clients have less of a chance at catching numbers of stripers or quality stripers from Lake Texoma’s sparkling water.

But that really isn’t the reason that he made the switch from being a conventional tackle guide and tournament fisherman more than a decade ago to being a full-time fly angler.

“In my case, it has put so much more fun back into fishing,” Hollensed said. “Because in my mind it really isn’t about how big the fish was that you caught or how many that you caught.

“It is more about how you caught them in the first place. And when that’s with a fly rod, well, I think it’s about as fun as fishing can be.”

Hollensed should know.

He’s got the pictures – and plenty of happy clients in recent weeks – to prove it.

First up is this week’s “Monday Movie” offering, a hauntingly beautiful trip for largemouth and smallmouth bass in one of the most stunning desert oasis’s in the world.

Like piscatorial visions from a midsummer night’s dream as the heat of July continues, check out this sweet video and chill out to some great bass action on the fly.

Stay cool and hook ‘em! 

That, of course, was before the epic fail of BP’s Deepwater Horizon drilling rig on April 20, 2010.

Followed up by a lackluster response from the Obama administration, the result has been the worst environmental disaster in American history.

Right in the backyard of what has become the holy grail of big bull redfishing on the fly.

The on-the-water office that Dini calls home.

You can’t blame Capt. Dini for relocating to a place where the Cafe Du Monde’s legendary chicory-laced coffee and powdered beignets help jumpstart each day.

A place where the crawfish etouffee beckons each evening at Bon Ton Cafe.

A place where nighttime jazz, blues, or Creole music can help soothe the troubled soul.

A place that has displayed the resiliency to climb out of the deadly horrors of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 to become the reigning 2010 pigskin champs of the civilized world.

Louisiana - its people, its culture, its food, its music, its plethora of natural resources, and most especially its amazing redfish – is a place to celebrate and cherish.

And these days, Louisiana is a place to weep for.

So after you watch today’s “Monday Movie” – a tremendous video piece produced by SaltyShores.com  - pause for a moment.

To reflect on what is.

To reflect on what has been.

And to reflect on – and to say a prayer for – what will be in the days to come for Capt. Dini and all of his Louisiana mates.

 May their tomorrows be brighter than their today is.

And may their fly reel drags sing again soon with the sweet music of Creole redfish heading for the deep ocean blue.