PORT O'CONNOR, TEXAS
8/13/00
The weather has been taking its toll on fishing and fishermen alike. The long string of days with 100'ish temperatures and lack of rainfall have brought us some serious challenges. Not only are the fish out of sorts, but the fishermen I've had out lately have had considerable difficulty keeping "their head in the game" during the hottest part of the day.
Trout fishing has been spotty with really good days mixed with very slow days. It seems that we're either blessed or cursed!
The bays are reaching salinity levels very near those seen in the Gulf and the normal migration and habits of bait species seem to have been disrupted. Put this together with water temperatures that are still climbing and considerable difficulty keeping bait (croakers) alive and you have "on again/off again" trout fishing. Even when the trout are located, the "bite" is pecky and light with few fish really pouncing on croakers the way we expect. None-the-less, we have had some very productive days and some catches that contained LARGE trout!
Our best success has come when wading shoulder deep and fishing the edges of drop-offs to deep water and deep guts that the tide has carved through the flats areas adjecent to grass beds and scattered shell. Convincing some people to fish this way has not been easy!
We've been letting the currents carry the croakers off the ledges into deep water when using live bait and working our soft plastics in opposite fashion, throwing into the deep water and hopping them back up the slope. Topwater action for trout has been pretty much restricted to early morning and late evening periods with a few exceptions when we picked up a few trout on the flats when fishing for reds in the late morning and early afternoon. What these guys were doing in the super heated shallow water and hitting topwaters is a mystery to me but they were there!
Predictably, the redfish action has been more consistent under the current conditions with limit catches being taken often. Gold spoons and small topwater plugs have been the best bet when conditions would allow.....we've had a floating grass problem for a good while that absolutely renders a topwater plug useless! Small shad style soft plastic lures in red, red/white and white/chartruese have been working well in "clean bottom" sight casting situations. If the bottom is grassy or the floating grass gets in your path, you'll need to rig as weedless as possible to keep the bait operational for more than a few yards of your retrieve.
I recommend deep wading if trout are your objective for the next several weeks. Reports from the surf and deep water reefs have been too spotty to convince me otherwise. Whatever your plan, get on the water early and drink plenty of fluids. Sports drinks and bottled water are probably the best remedy for keeping your strength up. Look for the redfish in areas that contain lots of crab traps and/or lots of blue crabs in sight. Most of the reds I've cleaned recently had crabs in their stomachs.
The trout are eating shad, mullet and croakers. Pay attention to locations that the shrimp boats and bait seining boats are working.......these areas should be holding trout as well as bait!
Good luck and Good fishing.......
Capt. Everett