Corpusfishing.com

[Prof. Salt]

While the college was closed for the holidays I spent a lot of time on the water, and several of the trips were really fantastic. Some of the cooler weather got fish to drop into deeper water, and if you could locate the holding structures, it was a busy time. On one long morning I caught 88 trout, 25 redfish and several other fish on a single Z-man Thick Trick lure. I retired it after the trip, but it still didn't have any visible damage aside from the neck not holding onto the jig hook too well. That's durability! Over the three mornings that I fished that cool snap I ended up (mostly releasing) 187 trout, 42 reds and a few drum. There was even a sea robin thrown in for variety. A few stringers are below.

Last Saturday I went back to Copano to look for reds. I arrived an hour before daylight so I anchored over an oyster pad to toss a jig for a while in search of any trout volunteers who wanted to play. I caught six trout including one 19" fish that went on ice. As the sky began to show a glimmer of light below the stars, I ran across the bay to be in place for early redfish. Tides were really low, and I stayed out of the back lakes in favor of open shorelines that are usually deeper. As the sun was getting ready to show itself I found a few tailers, and one 22" fish readily took the bait. A couple of feet down the shoreline I saw another tail and offered that one the bait. Yep, 23" fish on! Twenty yards farther down another tail popped up, and you know it, the last 24" red completed my limit in about ten minutes. I kept moving and found another tail, but as I closed it in snuck past and I was forced to make a back-hand cast to the fish. My aim was a bit off and the bait landed right on top of the fish, spooking it out of the area. It was a good thing I hurried over when I did, because within a few more minutes the tails all disappeared and the feed was over. I made a relatively fast 3 mile loop onto the Aransas river to search other likely shores for more reds, but it wasn't happening that morning. So I paddled right back out to the oyster pad in the open bay and resumed bouncing a jig for trout. That was the right call, and over the next hour I landed 28 trout, with only four fish below the slot. Then the wind switched and ramped up out of the North - that was enough to turn off the bite so I headed home smiling with limits of trout and redfish on ice.

Now the college has resumed business and it's meetings and arena registration events for the rest of the week, but it was sure nice to have success on those days off!

[awesum]

Good job Glenn. I was thinking maybe you'd been in a deer blind.

[Prof. Salt]

The neighbor beside our property died last year, and his girlfriend/common law decided to invite all her friends to shoot deer. They've been out every morning and evening that we have been around, and at this point they've pretty much wiped out the adult deer population. We only have a few resident does that live on our place, and traditionally the deer from a huge ranch across the creek flood over (through the neighbor's property) to our quiet area to get away from most of the rut activity. Our good bucks have usually been the losers coming over to the doe area to get away from the more aggressive bucks across the creek.

This may be the first time in 47 years that I don't get a deer, but I'm still trying.