Yesterday on world famous Pickwick Lake I witnessed a problem and on the last couple of times I have been smallmouth fishing. The problem I have seen is out of state fishermen coming to Pickwick Lake catching the famous smallmouth bass and putting them in coolers and killing the fish for their meat. I witnessed four boats from Missouri yesterday catching and keeping every smallmouth they caught. I was hoping that they were keeping them for maybe a weight-in for their club tournament. But I saw two of the boats load their boats with the fish still in their live-well and leave the parking lot. I also witnessed a boat from Tennessee with three fishermen in it that also kept everything they caught. They did not care if the fish were 1 pounders or 6 pounders. If you guys from out of state want to keep coming back to Pickwick Lake for great smallmouth fishing in the future you need to release at least the three pound fish and larger back into the lake so they can lay out their eggs during the upcoming spawn.

We want you to come to Pickwick for great fishing experience but you need to respect our resource and not keep all the fish you catch.If you want fish to eat catch them in your state or keep at least the smaller ones not the egg bearing size smallmouth,