The flounder run usually starts around the first week in November. "Watch the weather," Needham said, "and when it starts cooling off, start checking to see if they're moving."

If you don't use a guide, Needham suggested, fish to the mouth of the bayous on the Louisiana side of the lake.

Even though he's been fishing flounder for years, Needham loses about half the flounder he hooks. "Once they bite on something," he said, "they keep their mouths shut. That makes it hard to set the hook, because they clamped down on it where it can't move very well. A lot of the time, when they get right up to the boat they open their mouths and out comes your hook."

In Needham's view, the best strategy is to keep trying to set your hook as you reel the flounder in. While fall fishing is best for taking flounder, they can be caught in spring and summer. The best bet is to work the shallows or bottom-fish off piers and other structure.

In the spring, the cycle renews itself. Only a half-inch long, young fish return from the Gulf to the shallow water to grow up. But the mass behavior seen in the fall migration is not emulated by the flounder fry, which return as the mood strikes them, not all at once. They head for the grassy areas near the passes and move farther back in the bays as they get bigger -- which happens pretty fast. Within a year, they average about a foot long, only 2 inches shy of keeper dimensions.

The mass behavior seen in the fall migration is not emulated by the flounder fry, which return as the mood strikes them, not all at once. They head for the grassy areas near the passes and move farther back in the bays as they get bigger -- which happens pretty fast.

It appears that humankind is going to be able to help Mother Nature out a bit when it comes to flounder. Texas is the first state in the nation to begin experiments with raising flounder, a program inspired by the success that the state has had with raising redfish.

"We've already had some limited stocking," Fisher noted. "Last year we put 1,000 or so flounder off Aransas Pass. But large-scale stocking is still a few years away. We need more research to learn how to get them to spawn successfully in hatcheries."

Fisher feels that it's still too early to tell if the effort will be fruitful -- but he's optimistic.

If you want to help out in the campaign to make flounder even more plentiful, you can register on a first-come, first-served basis to participate in a TPWD Coastal Fishers Bay Team tournament. There's no registration cost, but entrants must be at least 21 years old.

Anglers who donate their flounder to be used for the state's hatchery breeding program will be eligible for drawings for prizes ranging from a Global Positioning System device to quality rods and reels.

This year's flounder tourneys are set for Oct. 18 at Port O'Connor, Oct. 25 at Pleasure Island, Nov. 8 at Texas City, and Nov. 15 at Aransas Pass. For more details, see www.tpwd.state.tx.us/fishboat/fish/programs/cfbt.