A fishing boat is reflected in the still waters on a branch of the O.H. Ivie Reservoir, at Concho Recreation Area, on Wednesday, Sept. 4, 2013.The bass at O.H. Ivie lake are getting bigger each year.
The ShareLunker program began in 1986 by the Texas Parks and Wildlife to promote and enhance bass fishing in Texas. Anglers who reel a largemouth bass that is a certain size can submit their catch information, get it weighed by an official scale and donate their fish to a hatchery. The fish could potentially be matched with another largemouth bass so it can breed even bigger fish, which are then released back into lakes across the state.
"We have the best science, great regulations on our reservoirs, and they're set up to produce these big fish," ShareLunker program coordinator Natalie Goldstrohm said."And we also have some great anglers that trust the Texas Parks and Wildlife with their fish." Jason Conn from Anna, a town just northeast of Plano, recently caught a 17.03-pound largemouth bass from O.H. Ivie, the eighth-heaviest largemouth bass ever caught in Texas, and the sixth largest donated to the ShareLunker program, according to Parks and Wildlife."I've been bass fishing my entire life and I know this fish I caught is the result of the ShareLunker program," Conn told state officials. "Hopefully she produces a lot of offspring that we can put all over the state.