We Finally Have an Update on our Dried Up Lake...

Added: 2026-05-24

[00:00:21]reporting to you live from the drain lake. We have updates.

[00:00:24]>> Big updates.

[00:00:25]>> Huge updates.

[00:00:26]>> Some would say the biggest updates.

[00:00:29]There's some water out there, >> but not that much water.

[00:00:32]>> Yeah.

[00:00:33]>> Not enough.

[00:00:33]>> Not enough, right?

[00:00:34]>> We need more.

[00:00:36]>> We need more water. But at least there is some water cuz we were like in a 6-month drought and it got really low, which has already gotten low and all the fish have died a couple times. It's kind of crazy to say a couple times is there was the first big fish kill where everything pretty much died, left about 10% of the fish population and then those kind of got through and they had successful spawn because because it rained the following spring and then there was a whole bunch of fish cuz the lake got back up to like almost normal.

[00:01:01]Got up to normal pool for a little bit and then it got back down. All the fish died again. So, I have no idea what's living in there. Do you?

[00:01:07]>> No. I think I saw some fish jump over there.

[00:01:09]>> I bet there's some gars. I bet there's some catfishes. I bet there's some drums. Actually, the drums got nuked.

[00:01:15]They were the first to go. And you would think that the drum would be like something that would survive pretty well, but they could they didn't make it very well. And there was some big old buffaloos. They're still in there. And we're planning on doing some fishing.

[00:01:26]But what we're doing today is giving y'all some massive updates. It's been a while since we did an update video here at the lake. We're down here on the lower end. The dam is back over there.

[00:01:35]And I can like say that the dam is there because there actually is a dam now.

[00:01:39]Woohoo.

[00:01:39]>> For the most part. I haven't been over there, but we're going to fly the drone and get some good looks at it. is that there's been a lot of progress made down there. Um, they've got like the new cool spillway structure put up and I think they're honestly just kind of waiting for some rain. This could be false. This could be fake news. I don't know if it is, but I think they're kind of waiting for it to rain some more so they can actually get back out here and finish up what they have to do out here in the lake. Like set the permanent boat trail markers, maybe add some additional fish structures that they can't get to. Um, and they need and they need water in the lake to do that. So, this is a start.

[00:02:13]It's rained about an inch and we've gained about 2 ft of water. Um, there's still probably I don't know. How many surface acres do you think of water there is, Jay? How many would you say there is in this entire lake right now?

[00:02:23]>> I have no idea.

[00:02:25]>> What do you think?

[00:02:26]>> If you were to guess >> 2,000 I don't know about that.

[00:02:31]>> I don't I don't know. I'm not good at that kind of stuff.

[00:02:33]>> You don't know. But there's about We got about a uh 60 acre pond right here right now, which is nice. And the lake probably has about I don't know 400 acres of surface water maybe. I don't know. But it's mostly shallow, mostly uninhabitable. If you look behind us, you can see there's a little bit of some fish structure action going on. Some little brush piles piled up. Got to make sure I don't step in some fire ants or cotton mouth nest. And got some little logs here kind of stacked up.

[00:03:03]Kind of nice. Probably be a good spot couple years from now or maybe a year from now. Who knows? Got some log jams.

[00:03:10]I kind of like it. I kind of dig it. Is your biggest regret today not bringing a fishing pole?

[00:03:15]>> Yes. I wish I would have brought a fishing pole cuz like I said, I saw some fish jump over there. There's somebody fishing.

[00:03:20]>> I bet there is probably a couple of sneaky two-lb bass in there. That would crush a buzz bait today. It's overcast.

[00:03:25]>> Oh yeah, >> seems like a very top watery day. If this was 2018 in a day like this, >> this time of year, >> we'd be smashing the fish >> on frogs.

[00:03:35]>> Yes, >> Jay would especially be smashing them on a frog. But anyways, Yep. So, this is y'all seen this before. This is what the lake looks like right now. Um, this is the zone that pretty much has the most water right now. There's another spot looks just like this, but yeah, there's water here. This main little creek channel, and then all that should be water where we're standing at right now should be over our heads.

[00:03:56]>> Yeah, >> it's pretty deep right here. Lake's very low. Don't let anybody fool you. The lake's lake is still very much drained, but they've got a lot of work going on over that way. and we're going to take y'all over there and show y'all the um the progress that's been made on the dam because that's probably the most important part.

[00:04:14]>> Yeah.

[00:04:36]So, that was that side of the road. And this is this side of the road.

[00:04:42]A lot more water over here. A lot more traffic. Woo.

[00:04:47]>> You think you catch fish over there if you tried?

[00:04:49]>> Oh, yeah. Feel like I could >> throw a little night crawler out there.

[00:04:52]Catch you a catfish.

[00:04:54]>> I could catch something.

[00:04:55]>> Catch something to catch a crappie out of that log jam. That's a log jam right there. We're kayaking right here.

[00:05:00]>> We should We caught some catfish here that one time.

[00:05:02]>> Yeah, >> that was after the fish died the first time.

[00:05:05]>> Yeah.

[00:05:06]>> So, >> it looks crazy.

[00:05:08]>> Yeah, it's a little loud, a little busy, but there's this is the majority of the water in the lake. And in the middle right there, you got a little bit of depth, but most of this water you're seeing, it's only, you know, maybe a foot max. And if you look there in the middle, you see that red and green pole?

[00:05:23]Those are the temporary boat trail markers. and they're going to um go in and put temporary poles in once they get enough water. So, that's why we're waiting on some additional water to fill the lake up.

[00:05:59]reporting to you live. We are at the dam.

[00:06:01]>> We've made it. We're here at the dam and there's a lot of people here working. We started over there at the bridge and we followed the creek all the way over here and we just flew the drone back behind us and it looks pretty crazy up there, doesn't it?

[00:06:17]>> Yes, it does. So you can see on the very end over here, we've got the spillway structure. They got the spillway and they got this auxiliary structure here in the middle. I think that's where they're going to be able to control some of the flow of the water. And I'm not even sure what all is going on over there to be honest, but it's a lot.

[00:06:31]They've got excavators and bulldozers everywhere. And yeah, it's it's coming along. And you can see it's it's holding a little bit of water. What's holding water? So if it rains, I think that the lake will come up. It'd be interesting to see what happens when we get some rain. But >> yeah. Well, >> and there's some wildlife out here.

[00:06:48]>> Yeah, there's some there's some geese, you know, geese and radioard sliders.

[00:06:51]Nothing too crazy. And I have seen a couple of fish pop here in this pool of water. And I'm sure there's some fish there in the creek that have swam around. So, I think the next step for me and Jay is to actually get out here and do a little bit of fishing. But, we wanted to show you guys um some of the progress. Not a whole lot has changed except for what they've done down here.

[00:07:08]Everything else back here behind us is all the same. They've got fish structures. They've got the temporary boat trail markers, but the main deal is finishing up the dam over here. And it's exciting. It looks crazy.

[00:07:32]Raise baby cover me.

[00:07:38]Come here. Close my eyes. Universe to see.

[00:07:48]You can see me.

[00:07:52]All right. So, we just gave you all the rundown of what the lake looks like down at the lower end and how the dam is coming along. But now we're up here on the upper end. We're actually here in the backyard and we're going to give you an update on what the lake looks like here on this uppermost region as well as the status of our our um dilapidated boat dock and uh yeah and and our in our upcoming plans to get it fixed and you know just kind of the other things that are going on here on this end of the lake. So, let's turn this thing around and give y'all a little look see. Here is our boat dock. And right here we have a bunch of materials we've been piling up um getting ready to add to the lake bed. We initially had planned to do this in the winter time, but we never got around to it. And now I'm regretting it because it looks like um the dang Peruvian Amazon out here, but we'll figure it out. We've got these posts here, which we're going to be using to um help stabilize our dock. We've got all of these concrete um spawning discs, which we're going to add out here. These are going to be for bluegill spawning sites as well as some largemouth bass spawning sites. Then we have these buckets of gravel which we will add to the discs. We're planning on making a full video um showing us setting them out and how they work. And I've also been accumulating a bunch of rocks. I've got a bunch of them. Those are going to kind of go up on the bank, kind of help stabilize it. As well as I'm planning on building a couple of rock piles. I think that'll be nice. But yeah, over here it kind of looks like we just teleported into Narnia with all this stuff growed up. There's just like no way for us to get back over here and cut this grass at the moment. Um, so these guys are just going to have to do. We'll figure it out when time gets there. But here's the dock. We're good. We're good. We're good. And then we got got these couple boards here we need to replace. Pretty much all the dock is good. the first, you know, 80% of it.

[00:09:46]But you get, you know, down here, we got a couple boards we need to replace, but all this is all stable. All this is good. And then when we get down here to the end, um me and Cypress had to rip this end of the dock out. And this is where we need to um focus most of our attention, try to get this thing fixed.

[00:10:04]We need new runners. Let me get some of those posts that I had back there I just showed y'all to get stabilized. But this is pretty much the zone because the end is perfectly stable. So, we might do some more things to support it also. But overall, the end of the dock looks good.

[00:10:19]It's just this section. And this section has been sketchy since the day we moved into this house. We just have been dealing with it and just kind of fixing it as we needed. But, um, we definitely want it to be in tiptop shape before the lake comes up. And we are kind of getting close to running out of time for that. As far as the bottom of the lake, it's just grass over here. It's just a bunch of grass. If you look there in the middle, that's our pool of water y'all probably been seeing, but it has been pretty much completely consumed with the alligator weed, which I'm afraid is going to be a pretty big problem once the lake comes up. So, the last time they really drained this lake down for a prolonged period of time was back in like 06 07. I was uh 13 and I fished here all the time. The lake was down, but it wasn't empty. They just had it for a draw down, but there was no water here. And when it came back up, all this I used to fish it was all open and then it came up and it was completely choked out with the alligator weed and they had to come here and spray it and it was like a couple of year ordeal before it was really, you know, easy to fish. It was a It was a struggle to get around.

[00:11:22]It was just thick mats and I'm afraid it's probably going to be a similar situation. Hopefully won't be too bad, but they're definitely going to have to do some spraying. And I I I'm pretty confident on that. Another thing that'll be interesting to see once the lake comes up is how well the fish take to these willows that have grown up. We got these black willows that are growing up kind of all over the place. We have a nice little patch there. There's a patch right there coming up like right in the middle of one of my brush piles. And then out that way you can kind of see there's several little bits of them. But on the other side of the lake or actually over over there over there there is just a forest of them. So that might be kind of crazy. I'm glad it's not as grown up here as it is over there. But we do have these willow trees that are growing up everywhere. We ventured away out here in the lake bed and you can just kind of see all this alligator weed matted up. It's just growing on the surface. It's pretty much everywhere and then when the water comes up, it's just probably going to rise up to the top with it. Now, the fish, they do like this stuff. Um, and it's kind of nice to have it in moderation, but it can get out of hand and can really choke out a lot of the area. But one thing that's definitely for certain is that we have caught a ton of fish relating to this alligator weed. Um, so like I said, it is nice to have a little bit out here, like little patches just kind of clumped up. But when it gets, you know, where you have like a whole football field length of it, um, all matted up together, also mixed in with some other stuff, it can it can be kind of crazy and again tough to handle and not the best for for boating around. So, uh, I'm not sure what it's going to look like when the lake comes up, but I'm sure it'll be addressed. This is another zone that I'm really excited about. When the lake comes up, you've got all these plants growing. These are some type of rush, kind of like a horse tail or like a tuli. Um, but these are growing up everywhere in this particular little zone. And the bluegill love these things. The bass do too. And the the remnants of these should stand for a while when the lake comes up. I recently fished a lake that that had just undergone um a renovation. And these little these little rushes, these little horsetail type plants were growing up everywhere in the water. And we caught a bunch of fish around them. We caught some bass on a frog. There was also some bluegill beds around them. And this little zone has historically been a really good spot for bluegill. So, I think that these are going to be a big hit for this zone. So, these things are cool. These have really established.

[00:13:46]They they started coming up the first year it was down, but now that we're kind of like in year in year threeish of this deal, they've really really taken on and gotten big. And like I said, I think that this is going to be a really good spot because the water here in this zone is pretty shallow. It's only a couple feet deep. So, these will be up out of the water. They may or may not survive long term, but in the short term, I think that they'll be really good. They'll at least provide a lot of cover for um little baby fish. And right here, we got a little baby cypress tree.

[00:14:15]Look at that guy.

[00:14:18]He needs to grow a little bit more if he's going to live when the water comes up. But cool to see some cypress trees trying to make their presence known back out here once again.

[00:14:49]Just want to have this on the record.

[00:14:50]this spot right here where all these willow trees are all growing up. Um, all together densely packed in this little zone. I think it's going to be a really good spot. Once they're done with this, the lakes up, they stock it, give the fish a couple years to grow, they're going to be all over this stuff. As long as it, you know, stays together. And I think it's obviously going to grow a little bit more, too. So, they get a little bit bigger. I think it's going to be a dynamite spot because if you look around, there's not anything else like that right here. It's some isolated cover, something different. It's in a good zone. And I'm excited to catch fish off one of these willow trees.

[00:15:23]It's going to be good. It's just crazy, too. I'm 6'4 and this tree is probably double my height at the moment. It's crazy that a tree can grow that much um in just a couple of years. I think I pretty much covered everything that there is to cover out here at the moment. Pretty much what you see is what you get. It's bunch of dried up lake. It got some aquatic plants trying to grow with no water. Uh we got all these willow trees popping up and thriving and yeah, everything here is just kind of just, you know, wishing that it was um immersed in 5t of water. And I too wish that there was 5t of water here right now so that we can get back to uh paddling across this scene. And um instead of walking across it as I I know there's going to be as soon as there's water here, there's going to be life.

[00:16:09]There's going to be a whole lot more to look at. There's going to be some fish.

[00:16:12]There's going to be frogs, turtles, snakes. It was just like last year when the water came up in the springtime. It was so awesome to see all the fish and all the life. And we are so ready for it to all return and get back to normal and hopefully um as good as it was and hopefully even better than it was. It's still to this day so crazy that this lake was drained with the fish that were in it. Um it was an amazing fishery, but hopefully it'll be uh as good or better once it's all done. And I'm just excited that we are nearing the finish line with all of this. But again, there's definitely some work to be done on our end. We got to get all our fish structures out here. We got to get our dock fixed. So, those are some videos y'all want to see. Again, let us know down in the comment section. And if you have any other ideas that we could do out here, we are open to all suggestions. But until then, that's it for this lake update. We'll probably hit y'all with one again um probably midsummer. I'm sure there'd be a whole lot more to talk about then. Hopefully, y'all enjoyed receiving all this news.

[00:17:10]If y'all did give this video a thumbs up, subscribe to the channel for more, and we'll catch y'all on the next one.

[00:17:15]Bye, guys.