It took Tyler Medica only one cast on June 5 to land the biggest bass of his life – an 11.9-pound fish that was oh, so special for many reasons.
Medica dropped a jig into the big fish’s wheelhouse around 6:15 a.m. She was in the boat shortly thereafter, then on her way to Buckeye Landing to be weighed, measured and become the first fish to qualify for the Toledo Bend Lunker Bass Program for the 2026-27 season.
The trip to Buckeye, it turns out, wasn’t the first one the big fish made.
She had been previously caught on Feb. 7 by Drake Wadsworth of Stonewall, La., during a Fishers of Men tournament. That day, she weighed 13.1 pounds, and that meant another couple of trips.
Breaching the 13-pound mark made Wadsworth’s big fish eligible for the Texas ShareLunker Program; she got a ride to a state fish hatchery in Athens, Texas, where she spawned under controlled conditions to produce fingerlings for future stocking back at Toledo Bend. Her reproductive duties complete, she was returned to Toledo Bend and released on May 25.
The right point
Medica and fishing buddy Travis Meche found her early Friday morning. They pulled up on a main-lake point near Slaughter Creek in 12 feet of water, dropped down the trolling motor and forward-facing sonar and immediately saw her and another bass lurking on what Medica called “a rough point.”
“There are several points around there, and we pulled up on a point that we’d talked about fishing (Thursday) night,” Medica said. “He was running the trolling motor, going to the right. I said, ‘Whoa, back, back!’
“She was down there with a bigger one. She was directly under the trolling motor, and the other fish was behind her. I dropped a jig down on top of her. It sort of hit her in the tail, and she turned around and picked it up. I felt the thump.
“I hit her, and she hit me. I said, ‘Giant,’ as soon as I hit her, then I said, ‘That’s a 12,’” said Medica, who was fishing a green pumpkin jig with a holographic blue skirt on 20-pound Seaguar FC on an ABU Revo reel and a Lews rod passed down to him by his grandfather. “I had a hard time getting her off the bottom. I was reeling and reeling, not getting any line back. I knew it was a big one, and I just grinded on her and had her up next to the boat in about 30 seconds.
“When she came up she was on her side, and she swung her tail around and splashed water all over us. She soaked us. I missed her the first time she came by the boat, but the second time, I lipped her and got her in.”
A tagged lunker
Medica and Meche immediately noticed the tag the big fish had received back in February. On a set of digital scales in the boat, she weighed 12.46 pounds. The two fishermen put her in the livewell and headed immediately to Buckeye Landing, where the fish was weighed and measured again: 11.9 pounds, 26 ¼ inches long and 20 ¾ inches in girth – about 1 ¼ pounds less than she weighed in February when she was full of eggs. Finally, she was released back into Toledo Bend, earning Medica a free replica mount of his lunker.
“I remember putting my hand around her tail, and it was so thick,” said Medica, 18, who will join the Northwestern State University bass-fishing team in the fall.
There, he’ll run into Wadsworth, who is already on the fishing team there.
