Reservation Number : 42970
Property Name : Red Lake
Reservation Date : 04/25/2025 All Day - 04/27/2025 PM
Total Fish/Sizes : Bunch
Lures Used : Everything!

PWF member Wendell Vines and I had a chance to fish the spectacular Blackbird Hunting and Fishing Ranch on April 25-27^th.  We had an outstanding experience!  Starting with the lodge and on to the lakes and to the communication with the ranch manager and ranch owner everything was first class.  The lodge is easily the nicest we have stayed in with PWF and was one of the highlights of the trip. The views from the lodge overlooking Redbird lake were stunning.

We arrived at 10:30AM on Friday morning and were fishing by 11.  We fished Redbird lake  from 11 to 2 then took a break at the lodge and returned to fish 4:30-7:30.  We caught both quality and numbers with a few near misses on giant bass and one giant landed.

Best fishing on Redbird was on the deeper side of the lake.  We fished soft plastics and chase baits  and they liked them both equally.  Some of the bigger fish were right on the dam and also out in the deeper parts of the lake in 10-12 feet of water.

We fished Harding Lake Sunday AM from 7:30-12:00 and caught bass over the whole lake.  We fished the club pontoon and it worked perfectly for us with our 40 lbs thrust trolling motor with winds ranging up to 15 mph with gust up to 20mph.  (anything more than that and you would probably need a 50lb motor)  The fish sizes at Harding were in gereral a bit better then Redlake with the average size probably around 3 pounds.  We caught a lot of fish between 3 and 5 pounds here.  We didn’t run into any giants on Harding but the fish were biting well every time and every where we fished on that lake.

We returned to Redlake Saturday PM and the fishing was slower after having pounded the lake the previous day.  Wendell did latch onto another 8+ pound fish along the dam on Saturday evening.  We fished mostly soft plastics that evening.

We returned to Harding Sunday moring for more solid fish and the fish were biting better when we left than at any time we fished there.  We never went more than a few minutes without a bite.

We got the go ahead from the Ranch owner to fish Blackbird lake on Sunday afternoon and got about two hours of fishing before we had to return to Katy.  We caught only 3 fish but the fish we caught were good ones ranging up to over 8 pounds.  We had two huge blowups that we didnt connect with as well.  The fish it seems were concentrated in one 100-yard section of the lake (midlake opposite the dock).  We would like to have a bit more time on that lake as it seems the numbers are lower than Redlake and Harding but the sizes were very large.

All in all we had a great outing!  We will be back with our wives next time.

Thanks to the owner and ranch manager at the ranch and to PWF fishing staff for making ranches like this available to us!  We had a ball!