2 weeks Ago By By MATT WILLIAMS For The Daily Sentinel
Four Texans placed among the Top 25 in the Bass Pro Tour Stage One event held Jan. 30 — Feb. 2 at Lake Conroe.
Alton Jones, Jr. of Waco fished his way to a fourth-place finish in the championship round with 69-04 pounds on 26 bass. He won $30,000.
Todd Faircloth of Jasper finished 12th, $15,800; Takahiro Omori of Emory, 20th, $15,000; and Jeff Sprague of Wills Point, 23rd, $10,000. Justin Cooper of Zwolle, LA., won the tournament’s top prize of $150,000 with 78-05 on 34 bass.
It is Cooper’s first win as a top level pro. Wardens bust duck hunters or illegal hunting activity Four duck hunters are facing stiff fines for illegal hunting activity in Texas. According to a Feb.
2 Texas Game Wardens Facebook post, wardens from Hamilton and Bosque counties issued multiple citations to the men — three from Louisiana — for several hunting violations including exceeding the bag limit, hunting without a valid license and using lead shot for waterfowl. TPWD says the wardens encountered the men after a volley of shots and satellite mapping lead them to a private lake on the morning of Jan. 25.
There, they discovered 54 ducks — three times the daily bag limit of six per licensed hunter. The post says the three Louisiana hunters admitted to knowing they had exceeded their daily bag limit but didn’t want to stop shooting as they claimed this was more ducks than they had seen all season in both Texas and Louisiana. Additionally, wardens found about 250 shotshells and spent hulls containing prohibited lead shot.
One of the hunters did not have a valid hunting license. In addition to citations, the hunters were charged civil restitution for the illegally harvested ducks. TPWD says the fines and restitution total for the group is more than $7,000.
Lady Bird Lake ShareLunker On Feb. 5, bass angler Willie Pipken landed a 14.05 pound Legacy Lunker at Lady Bird Lake.
It’s the third Legacy Lunker of 2025 and a pending lake record for the 468-acre reservoir located in downtown Austin. The former record is a 13.50 pounder caught in 2015.
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