CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — When Jim Costlow walks out to Lake Corpus Christi behind his property in Lake City, it brings a smile to his face.
A month ago, there wasn’t any water to walk up to.
It was just a bunch of dirt and dry, cracked mud with hardly any plants poking through, except weeds.
A month ago, breathing heavy, Costlow walked about half a mile to the edge of the water. Now it’s up to his property, and he doesn’t have to walk far.
“We like it. We can use the lake again,” he said.
Costlow is glad he is able to fish and use his boat again.
Luckily for Costlow, water returning to the lake behind his house means more fish are in the area and he doesn’t have to go further out into the lake to catch them.
“The bait fish are still in here, so they’re coming in. The big fish come in after the bait fish,” he said.
Taking a PVC pipe, Costlow measured the water levels on Thursday, as he does everyday. He started noticing the water returning to the part of the lake behind his house last week because of all the storms.
However, even with more water in the lake compared to last year, he said the lake still needs about 3 feet of water to get back to normal levels.
“When that pier — that floating pier — is level, I can walk straight out, it’s full. A year ago the lake was full. It’s not full yet,” he said.
Billy Moorefield also lives on Lake Corpus Christi and is enjoying seeing the water levels much higher than they were a month ago.
He looked at a vast expanse of dirt and mud a month ago, the water further away from his property, now the water coming up to his house.
“As it progressively gets fuller and fuller, next thing you know, you wake up one morning and there you have water,” Moorefield said.
Moorefield said he would take a lawn mower and use it to cut the weeds. He said because there was no water, the large amount of dirt allowed weeds to grow quicker.
“We mowed the weeds down to keep it from being as tall as this is right here. where you could see the water anyway. And it’s better for anyone who wants to fish,” he said, pointing to tall weeds.
Moorefield said because of the higher water levels, he’s noticing more fisherman out on the water.
Lake Corpus Christi State Park officials are also allowing boats on the boat ramp that they closed about a month and a half ago due to the lower water levels.
“I just hope that everyone’s happy that the lake’s coming up,” Moorefield said.
