Even in my early years, fishing was my world. That is true, for the most part, even to this day.  Having been born in the 1970’s and growing up in the 1980’s, I learned early on that fishing was much more than just a sport.  My father’s family hailed from Southern Illinois and Kentucky, and most often lived in remote areas with few comforts like running water. Our family made their way to New Mexico where I was born and bred (but we moved around a lot).  I have many wonderful memories of going fishing with my dad and his Uncle Billy.  It was mostly from Uncle Billy that my dad and I started on the road to become successful fishermen.

Being part of a large family with limited finances meant we didn’t even own a boat.  Bank, bridge and pier fishing was my only way to access the waters. I didn’t limit my fishing to one or two species; whatever bit my hook was the choice for the day. On his days off, my dad and I would often spend time fishing on the Pecos River. We would also regularly travel many miles the seine ponds for bait, often water dogs (early stage salamanders).  Fishing and camping by rivers was pretty much all my family did for vacations.

Some of my favorite early memories revolve around fishing with my dad on railroad bridges in Louisiana.  Being quite young and not yet that strong, my dad would secure me to the bridge by tying a rope through my belt loops so that some giant fish I hooked would not pull me over the side.  And giant fish we did catch.  Fishing with heavy line and crude equipment I couldn’t much afford to replace, I learned to never let go… never let the fish get the better of me. That burning desire to match wits and strength with the fish set the tone for my teens years and even the rest of my life.

In my pre-teen and early teen years, I spent summers in Louisiana.  It was there that my cousins and I would hike great distances through the woods and marsh lands to explore and experience new and exciting fishing waters.  Even though it was incredibly dangerous in those remote places having an abundance of snakes and wild beasts, we would always just would grab our rods and go. Our reward for going the extra mile was often catching trophy size bass, giant bluegills and amazing crappies.  We lived in Lake Charles for a time and I spent many outings catching saltwater fish.

When I was old enough to drive, I bought an old 1966 pickup truck and a small john boat (no motor) so I could finally get out on the small waters to fish.  About that time, we also started crappie fishing at Lake Stanford and would fish from a crappie barge.  For $2 a pole, we could fish all day and night for crappie through holes in the barge floor while sitting comfortably in stadium-style seating.

Though I was developing a passion for crappie fishing, I still didn’t, at first, know much about finding them away from the barge or shore. I slowly began to develop an understanding of the seasonal patterns of the crappie and where to find them at different times. It was through many years, many trips on the water, much trial and error that I began to accumulated knowledge about the who, what, when, where, why and how of successful crappie fishing.

I made Texas my permanent residence in 2009.  In 2010, I purchased my first kayak, a peddle-drive Native Slayer (although I have owned many kayaks since then).  Once I had my first kayak, I was able to truly explore any lakes or rivers for all species of fish. My knowledge and fishing skills grew exponentially better from that time on.

I would fish for catfish, largemouth bass, white bass, stripers, saltwater fish, and of course, crappie. This was before today’s type of advanced fishing electronics were available, which meant, to be a successful fisherman, you needed to use your head more than use your electronics.  Learning more by spending an enormous amount of time on the water (paying my dues), without the benefit of today’s advanced electronics, gave me a grounding in using all of my hands-on experiences, observations and senses to help me figure out the body of water and the fish.  While in my earliest days, the imaginary scoreboard might have read “Me: 3, Crappie: 22”, by this time it had most often become more like “Me: 25, Crappie: 0”.

In 2015, I started my own fishing charter business.  I had been certified (level 2 coastal guide) through the American Canoe (and Kayak) Association and licensed to guide in the State of Texas.  I enjoyed guiding guests on successful fishing trips to lakes in Northeast Texas that I had come to know fairly well. This was at a time when fishing electronics had not yet advanced to a level where one could readily find submerged offshore fish cover and habitat; that was mostly a matter of many, many hours on the water searching with 2D sonar to find hidden brushpiles, stumps and rocks. While I was successful at getting the guests on to fish at productive habitat I had discovered, it became problematic when all too often the guests I had served would take boatloads of friends and camp out on  to the very spots I had reveled to them. Pretty soon success for my guests became more of a challenge due to my shrinking collection of otherwise unknown prolific fishing spots.  At about this same time, the heavy demands of my other business interests, namely a few coffee shops and a restaurant, pulled me away from my professional fish guiding business (for a time).

Later, after selling my restaurant businesses, I embarked on a career in real estate and real estate photography but never lost the interest and the tug to be a professional fishing guide.  By that time, fishing electronics had tremendously advanced with side imaging and forward view sonar, adding tools which greatly improved the ways of finding submerged and offshore fish habitat. These tools opened up a new vista for me in that I could employ the electronics to locate promising habitat and use my hard-earned fishing knowledge to successfully fish those productive spots. As a result, my collection of little known fishing spots on a great number of lakes, rivers and creeks has grown almost exponentially. It is no longer a problem when my past guests camp on spots that I showed them  as I have plenty more to choose from and many other bodies of water to fish.

In 2020, because of my lifelong passion for fishing and helping others to become better anglers, I started the YouTube channel “BarFly Fishing Texas.” The term “BarFly” is an inside joke within my family so I decided to use it as the name for my channel.  While the fishing trip videos I created for the channel included catching a range of species including catfish, largemouth bass, white bass, stripers, hybrids and Crappie, I quickly found that the interest in and demand for Crappie fishing videos far surpassed those of all other species. The light bulb in my head lit up and I realized that in today’s world, especially in North, Northeast and East Texas, Crappie are “king.”  So ever since then I have focused my time and efforts toward furthering the sport of Crappie fishing.

In 2021, I was decided to return to my career passion and once again become a professional fishing guide with a predominant focus on Crappie.  And Top Dawg Crappie Guide Services was born.  My parallel career in real estate photography is usually flexible enough to enable me to be a full time fishing guide. I truly love taking guests out on the water; young or old, experts or complete novices, strong and healthy or physically challenged.  Everybody deserves to have the opportunity to go fishing and I try to do my part to make that a reality.

As previously mentioned, my earliest years of fishing taught me many lessons and secrets to successful fishing and catching.  I enjoy passing on much of what I had learned then, and what I have also learned from the many years, untold number of trips and countless limits of fish, to my guests. Here are some of my thoughts about fishing and my philosophy:

• Fishing ain’t fun unless it’s FUN – So much of enjoying fishing is attitude.  My trips are not like a professional crappie fishing tournament… pressure and stress, making every cast or drop count, competing with nameless others. I encourage my guests to relax, to not put pressure on themselves, to not agonize over the one that got away.  Fishing’s first name should be “FUN.”  If you watch my BarFly Fishing Texas videos, you know that I let my inner child show through and express my elation by hooping and hollering when I (or my guests) catch a big fish. My hope is that my enthusiasm will be infectious for my guests and that they will truly have a fun time on the water.  My tagline is “Experience the Thrill of the Thump“, and when my guests have that thrill, it makes the trip all that more fun.
• More is Better – I believe more waters are better… more lakes, rivers and creeks to guide on is ultimately better for the guest. Being able to approach a body water and “fish the moment” (not fish the same old few places every day with guests) yields its own rewards.  This entails more thinking, exploring and risking on my part, and on the part of my willing guests, to find and catch Crappie this way.  But the tips, tricks and lessons learned by the guests in this “fish the moment” approach pay dividends long after the guided trip with me is over.
• Success is not “Success” – There is no one definition of “success;” one person’s ‘success’ may be another person’s afterthought. In the world’s view of fishing, success is typical measured in numbers and/or pounds.  But more often than not, I find that many of my guests mostly want to gain knowledge about a given lake, or get experience interpreting fish finder readings (especially Livescope), or pick up tips and practice fishing presentations, or just spend time on the water watching their novice friend, child or grandchild haul in their first big fish. It is important to me to know and understand what the hopes or expectations are for each guest and then I do my best to meet or exceed those expectations.
• Choices, choices… Trophy or Grocery – Some guides will take their clients out for number (grocery fishing) while others take clients out mainly for weight (trophy fishing). I believe in and practice both. In the ideal world, a trip would involve catching large numbers of large fish. And sometimes that is achieved. I believe in tailoring the trip to the conditions on the ground (er, the water) to what the fish want and will give on any given day and at any given hour.
• Low Hanging Fruit is for the Birds – Anglers don’t need a professional guide to take them to the easiest spots on a lake like bridge pillars.  I leave the “low hanging fruit” to other less experienced or overly frustrated fishermen.  I prefer to challenge myself and put my guests in situations that they would otherwise never get to experience. It’s much more fun to find and catch fish away from the community holes, crowds and spying eyes.
• Wanted: Dead or Alive – Some fishermen and guides are set on crappie fishing only one way: exclusively with artificial lures / crappie jigs (might think of that as “dead”) and exclusively with live bait (“alive”). I will use whatever the fish want on any given day, unless the guest is dead set on fishing only one way. Often times, the lack of willingness to be flexible results in fewer fish being caught. I prefer to leave it up to the fish to tell me what they want on any given day (and it can even change throughout the day).
• If you give a man a fish, he eats for a day, but… – You’ve probably heard the saying “if you give a man a fish he eats for a day, but if you teach a man to fish he eats for a lifetime.” Am I right?  That is my philosophy too.  I believe it is so very important to let the guests do as much during a fishing trip as they are willing and able to do… baiting their hook, taking their fish of their hook, tying on new jigs, reading the fish finder, managing the boat, etc. I’ve heard it said that the best managers and leaders in a business are those who can teach, train and lead subordinates to do for themselves; to be their own supervisors. I try to do the same so guests can begin to feel more confident that they can be successful when fishing on their own. I heard from the grandfather of one elementary-age girl (who had previously been on several guided fishing trips with her dad  using other fishing guides), that she really enjoyed herself on my boat because I let her do, and even encouraged her to do, most everything on her own.
• If you stop learning, you die – Lifetime learning is a must. When we stop learning, we die (or become essentially dead to handling new challenges in life).  I believe I have some natural skills in teaching or mentoring others in the field of fishing (at least that’s what many of my guests tell me). So I make the effort to impart to guests as much practical fish and fishing knowledge as I can while on a trip.  More often than not, guests ask me questions about the types of rods I use, line sizes and jig colors.  These are the easy questions and don’t actually help an angler really progress. The kind of topics I try to teach them revolve more around fish biology, feeding behavior, and seasonal patterns. Also discussing the effects of changing weather, water and other environmental conditions is likewise important. Though there is an abundance of media available (like YouTube) to help anglers learn about fishing, there is no substitute for hand-on learning on the water, especially when being mentored by a knowledgeable, experienced and willing guide.
• And a little child shall lead them… – It is interesting that, in my experience, when I have had an adult and child (like a father and son or daughter) together on a boat trip, the child often has better fish catching results than the adult (even if the adult is more experienced).  I have found that the youngster is more open minded and often pays more attention to the pointers and instructions that I give out than the adult.  By the kids putting into practice what I suggest, they tend to do better.  So it’s best to take the advice of the guide… that’s what you’re paying him for.
• Your fishing legacy; pass it on – While many or perhaps even most anglers prefer to fish alone, I believe it is most important to perpetuate the sport within the family or close community by inviting them to join in on the fishing. In doing so, you may be creating a lifetime of memories and a legacy for generations to come.

On a personal note… I am married to my lovely bride and occasional fishing partner, Katie, and have 4 children.  As of the time I started Top Dawg Crappie Guide Services, my children were ages 20, 17, 12 and 8.  We live in the northern outskirts of Dallas, Texas in the city of Prosper.  I taught all of my kids how to fish and I continue to support them in developing their own passion for it, so my family’s legacy will continue.  For example, I gave my 12-year old son a Hobie kayak one Christmas when he was only 5 years old and for the next several years, he was taking his kayak out to the middle of Lake Lewisville by himself to catch fish (and he caught plenty of them).

In my younger days, I worked in the digital world, mainly with computer networks.  At one time, I was considering becoming a chef and received culinary training at the Arts Institute.  So I am amply qualified to be called a gourmet cook and I make a number of mean crappie dishes. I have also received training in the field of graphics design.

Some time back, as a hobby, I started tying my own Crappie jigs. In 2022, I took lure-making to a new level when I purchased the necessary equipment and supplies to manufacture my own line of Crappie soft plastics.  I also had some apparel made with the BarFly and Top Dawg logos.  These shirts and hats, along with the Crappie soft plastics, are available to purchase on the website.