TexasKayakFisherman.com est. 2000

[OldTownYakBoi]

I’ve just received an email this morning from Texas Fish & Game stating the STAR Tournament will only feature Redfish divisions this year.

The email states, “Recognizing the extraordinary impact of the recent winter storm, the CCA Texas 2021 S.T.A.R. Tournament will feature a significantly revised format. The speckled trout, flounder, sheepshead and gafftop divisions have been removed entirely from this year’s tournament.”

I’m not going to lie I’m a little bummed out, but not surprised. Get ready to be elbow to elbow in the marsh this summer, everyone and their momma will be searching for reds. TKF, what are your thoughts on the decision?


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[ben_beyer]

I've heard reports of some 18-19" Flounder washing ashore after the freeze and they were in trouble per the regulation changes. Given the death of Trout and Sheepshead from the freeze and still not knowing the real impact, I think it is good to remove those categories as a precaution.

While we do not know the real impact of the freeze yet, it is my opinion that it is better to play it safe and protect the bigger trout that may be left for repopulating the bays. The same holds true for other species.

[karstopo]

Totally okay with the move by CCA. I didn’t enter the STAR last year, first time in several years not to. Haven’t made up my mind about this year. I think I’m still a member of CCA, I did the three year deal, maybe this is the last year. Trying to decide if CCA is still about helping Texas fish or is it becoming more of a help thy self to contribution money scheme and perks for the leadership. Organizations mature and often can go astray of their original mission, not 100% clear where CCA is these days. I just don’t know. Some people closer to fishing than I and that by all appearances care about the fishery have certainly soured on CCA. But, others are still all in.

Freeze was likely late enough in the winter to catch at least some of the returning from the gulf big female flounder already inshore, hope it wasn’t too many.

Hard it is to compare this freeze to the ones in the 1980s. Back then, zero social media, zero video and smart phones, zero widespread instant imagery posting up on every imaginable fishing related website. There was no internet back then. Overlay the technology and internet, YouTube and social media of today onto the freeze event of the 1980s and how would that look?

My gut tells me this event wasn’t as bad as those events, certainly on the upper coast, but it’s hard to be definitive. The information overload bounces around these days and gets magnified and distorted beyond all original proportions. Humans have never had to deal with as much extraneous information coming at up through multiple channels as we do now, are we up to the task?

[SWFinatic]

Good move to make these changes IMO. We did see a keeper size flounder in Estes last Saturday that didn't make it but that was the only one we saw. I'm certain there are more but since flounder don't have a swim bladder it may take them longer to surface if they surface at all. From what I understand TPWD is waiting to do the gill net survey to determine the impact of the freeze and that won't be complete until June so early July at the earliest before we hear of any changes that may or may not take place.

[saltykat]

Great decision by them even though it will hurt their bottom line. Last thing they need to do is a kill a bunch of big trout that need to restock the bays