National award named for Texas angler

Richard M. Hart was all about fishing, and teaching others to fish. He fished several times each week, and helped raise the money for the building at the Texas Freshwater Fisheries Center, named the Hart-Morris Conservation Center. He was featured in Lone Star Outdoor News for catching 24 bass topping 10 pounds. He caught a then world record Dolly Varden in Alaska in 1996. And he took pro angler and former Bassmaster Classic champion, Alton Jones, on his first fishing trip in a bass boat when Jones was 6 years old. Hart was inducted into Texas’ Freshwater Fishing Hall of Fame in 2006 and the National Fresh Water Fishing Hall of Fame in 2010. He died in 2016.

Hart also believed in the Fish Art Contest, which announced a national award to honor an exemplary educator, called the Richard M. Hart Educator of the Year Award. According to Wildlife Forever, Richard M. Hart which administers the program, the award will recognize an educator who participates in the Fish Art Contest and actively strives to expose youth to nature and the joys of fishing.

“Mr. Hart knew the Fish Art Contest was an excellent way to reach kids that might be unfamiliar with fishing,” said Zoe Ann Stinchcomb of the Texas Freshwater Fisheries Center. “His goal was always to get folks, especially kids, outside fishing. It makes perfect sense to honor teachers who are doing just that with the Richard M. Hart Award.”

The winning educator will receive a gift card for $1,000 to use for supplies for their classroom and a $900 stipend to facilitate outdoor learning for their school.

PORT ARANSAS: 61 degrees. Redfish are good from the north jetties on live shrimp. Speckled trout are fair in the bays on shrimp, mullet and croaker.

CORPUS CHRISTI: 60 degrees. Speckled trout are fair to good on shrimp. Black drum and redfish are good underneath the causeway on cut mullet and shrimp. PORT O’CONNOR: 63 degrees. Speckled

BAFFIN BAY: 52 degrees. Redfish are good in the flats on shrimp and top-waters. Speckled trout are good on shrimp in the shallows. Black drum are good in the channels on shrimp and croaker.

PORT MANSFIELD: 65 degrees. Speckled trout and redfish are fair over mud and grass on paddle tails and suspending lures, and on live shrimp under a popping cork.

SOUTH PADRE: 68 degrees. Redfish are good in the flats on cut bait on bottom rigs. Speckled trout are good in deeper water on shrimp.

PORT ISABEL: 68 degrees. Speckled trout and redfish are fair around shallow grass flats on shrimp and soft plastics. Black drum are good on shrimp in deeper water.