Bois d’Arc Lake near Bonham, Texas (northeast of Dallas) is on fire for fishing and only will get better, say anglers and guides who know the lake well. It is the first reservoir to open in the state in decades, following well-known bass hot spot O.H. Ivie Lake in 1990.
Bois d’ Arc is managed by the North Texas Municipal Water District and filled to full pool in 2023. Public fishing was delayed until mid-April 2024. And almost immediately it began giving up huge fish, with a 9-pound largemouth caught that spring. The bass was only 20-inches long and fat as a football.
Channel cats stocked as fry in 2021 already are huge with 10-pounders being caught. Last March guide Jason Conn led an angler to a 2.74-pound Bois d’ Arc crappie.
It’s no accident that Bois d’Arc already is giving up bass and catfish over 10 pounds and crappies weighing almost three pounds. Texas Parks & Wildlife Department (TPWD) personnel planned the lake carefully to ensure it would have top fishing. As it was being flooded to full pool TPWD introduced thousands of selectively-bred largemouth bass in brood ponds before the lake filled. Then fishing was delayed for another year to allow stocked fish to spread and acclimate to the reservoir.
The resulting catches by anglers since 2024 have been nothing short of astounding.
Anglers caught an incredible 98,000 bass, crappies and catfish from April to June of 2024, according to a TPWD survey. While 31,000 total fish were caught, only 2 percent of the largemouth bass were kept by anglers during the first three months of the survey.
TPWD has set a strict 16-inch maximum length limit on largemouth bass at Bois d’Arc Lake to promote growth of larger trophy bass. That, plus catch-and-release of large bass, is setting the stage for another superb Texas fishery that could rival other stellar waters such as O.H. Ivie and Lake Fork Reservoir.
“Bois d’Arc looks almost identical to Lake Fork,” 45-year-old guide Jason Conn tells Wired2fish. “I was the second boat on the lake when it first opened, and I’ve been guiding on it full time ever since.
“The bass eat everything, and the lake is full of baitfish. Bass top out at about 11 pounds, but that’s sure to increase as the lake ages and fish grow.”
Conn says the lake has a good stained water color. There’s flooded timber in about half the reservoir, with plenty of deep water and bottom structure.
“There are tons of 4- to 6-pound bass in the lake,” says Conn of Anna, Texas, a full-time guide for 13-years. “On a good day a party of my anglers will catch 30 bass or more and a 5-fish bag will weigh 30 pounds or better.”
Conn helped TPWD confirm that bass stocking in Bois d’Arc Lake was successful. TPWD genetically confirmed that an 8-pound bass caught by Conn was one of the first six-inch largemouths stocked years earlier in a lake “brood pond” as Bois d’Arc was being filled to full pool.
Biologists believe that Bois d’ Arc bass are adding about two pounds of weight per year. The fish are genetically superior “ShareLunker” largemouths produced by the state’s fish breeding program to grow heavyweight bass.
“I anticipate that the bass fishery will likely explode as the bass continue to grow to some impressive sizes in the next few years,” said Dan Bennett, a TPWD fisheries biologist out of its Denison office. “We hope to maximize the survival of the largest bass with the restrictive length limit for as long as possible, so the fish spawn and produce many future generations of trophy bass in the reservoir.”
In late July, 11-year old Caden Wilson of Lannius, Texas caught the Junior Lake record bass on Bois d’ Arc while fishing with guide Conn. Wilson caught the 10.06-pound bass while fishing a shaky head plastic worm in 12 feet of water near a flooded tree line.
He weighed the fish on certified scales that Conn carries on guide trips, then the big bass was released. Caden, his 8-year-old brother Blake and grandfather Mike Burpo caught about 35 bass that day before they stopped fishing at 2 p.m., said Conn.
Bois d’ Arc has three good boat access areas scattered around the lake. The Fannin County Chamber of Commerce is a helpful aid to anglers wanting to visit the lake area for accommodations, motels, etc.
“The Bois d’ Arc record bass is 10.63 pounds, and the fish are topping out now at about 11 pounds,” said Conn, who caught the state’s 8th largest bass weighing 17.03 pounds from O.H. Ivy Lake. “But I’m sure some monster fish are going to be coming from Bois d’ Arc over the next few years.”
