Corpusfishing.com

[Prof. Salt]

The King tides lately do not make sight fishing easy, but I wasn't going to just stay home. I accepted the challenge Friday after work, and headed to the water at "low tide". When I arrived, the water was still around the high tide mark, but was lower than it had been so I set out to see what I could find. My usual shallow flats were knee-deep and even along the edges fish could not be seen if they were feeding along the grasses - there was just too much water to be able to see fish signs. So I slowly worked around connecting areas that were grassy flat connected to other lakes. I knew some redfish somewhere in these areas would be tailing. After all, it's October and that's what redfish do! It took a while to locate the first group, but they popped up ahead of me so I used the wind to drift the kayak into range. I noticed that my craw lure in green pumpkin color was visible in the dirty water, so I had ordered some Trick Shotz in the same color. I didn't realize until they arrived that I had ordered the large size. So I rigged them on a larger Pro Bullet hook rather than the usual lighter and shorter "finesse" hooks. The larger bait and hook paired well, and as soon as the bait landed among the redfish it got slammed. The fish ran several times and there wasn't much I could do aside from just hanging on. The little reel dumped line and the fish ran all over the flat. When he finally came to the net I could see why. It was over 28" and got to swim away. I looked around for more tails but couldn't find them, so I moved to the next lake and tried an area with similar drain and grass features. There weren't visible fish here, so I went back to the first area to give it one more shot before moving to a new area. I couldn't find tails out in the middle, but as I worked back toward the exit, I spotted two pods of fish near a shoreline. I approached the first and tossed the bait just past them. The eat was quick as a hard thump signaled another good fish. This one tore right through the other group I had hoped to hit next, and over the next few minutes I had to be patient as the fish wore down. At just over 30" this one wasn't a fish that could be hurried. I got the bright orange fish unhooked and released, then began to check other shorelines along the lake. I found another group of tails and approached from downwind. Big tails were visible, but I watched until I spotted some smaller ones along one side. I placed the bait over there and when the thump came, I hoped this one would be a keeper. As I moved it from the net to the measuring board I was happy to see 27.5" indicated on the tape. At least I had one to take home with me. I worked all around the lake again, hoping to find more. At one point I found a last set of tailing fish, and as I placed the lure just beyond them, my line brushed over the tail of one of the fish. They shot in all directions and I knew that group wasn't going to be visible again for a while, so I headed back to the bay. As I worked back across the open bay I deployed a pair of swim baits, hoping to catch a keeper trout as I worked back into the wind. Before I got back to the launch I had released two undersized trout and a gafftop. I has happy with the one nice fish I brought back, and since Saturday morning was looking like higher water I decided that Saturday would be my first archery sit of the season. It's kind of warm for archery in my book, but with water this high, I knew spotting fish wasn't going to be likely.

[awesum]

Stay with 'em Glenn. Thanks!