Pushing Reds

Even I get to catch one occasionally.

Air Assault

This is where I learned that the Nikon D200 at high ISO in low light does not perform well. A lot of noise.

Slap Shot

Merlin

Zoom, Zoom!

John Pilmer, (pictured above, traveling incognito), flew in from San Antonio Friday night, took a cab to the storage facility where he stashes his Toyota, and came to stay with me. On Saturday morning, we drove to Arroyo and picked up his Maverick HPX-T that he has stashed in a storage facility there. Yeah, fishing is that important.
As we were getting the boat ready and our stuff put on board, we noticed the clouds gathering to the north. We needed to get on the water before we lost sunlight. Why? John's passion is fly fishing in clear, shallow water and seeing the fish eat the fly. What's not to like about that? I'm all in.
The first location was way more shallow than we expected and the water was muddy. If I had shut down, I was sure we would be grounded and that would make for a very long day.
We finally ended up further south where I turned his boat out of the Intercoastal and headed east. Almost immediately the water became clear and that caused me to shut down deeper than I had intended. I decided I would pole him into more shallow water and see what happens. When we finally got to water that was about a foot deep, we started seeing trout. Some were in the 25" range and crusing in groups of 2 and 3. You just don't see that everyday.
John is one of the best fly casters I've fished with, but this was exciting stuff; and with the breeze coming from the east straight into his face, it was tough to get a fly in the right place and have the fish eat. It seemed that all the big boys were sulking straight away from the boat, whether they were at the 9:00, 12:00 or 3:00 position so any cast would be over their back. At one point, after a good cast set the fly down in the perfect spot, but was refused by a large trout, even John said his hands were shaking.
After a moment to gather our nerves, we came upon a large clearing that had 3 or 4 smaller trout sitting around, seemingly, looking at each other. A quick cast later and the smallest one, (of course), nailed the fly.
It was a small, maybe 15" trout but it was perfect and beautiful. As John and I watched the released fish slowly swim away, the clouds moved in and the wind turned and increased out of the north.
That was the end of that.

Trout Portrait

Gadwall

I think. Let me know if I have misidentified him. I'm not a duck hunter.

No Step!

Shrimps Nightmare

This is not what a shrimp wants to see in his rear view mirror.

Today was tough. The N.E. wind did not settle down and it felt like it was freezing, although it was actually in the 60's. Again, the normal low January tide was even lower than usual. We managed a couple of trout but could not get the precious few redfish we saw to eat.

Who Pulled the Plug?

For some reason, water in the bay was extremely low and from the Arroyo to south of Cullen channel, the tide was ripping out. Many flats that we normally fish were completely dry. The flat that had been filled with redfish a few days ago proved to be a waste of time today, and scary shallow.
I took Johnny Q. and Mike Munoz to my favorite trout hole when conditions are like this. It did not disappoint. We also found some redfish near the intercostal, on a flat that had some deep potholes.
I'm on the water for most of the week so this is all I was able to edit today. More later.

Red Heads

Osprey

Sunrise over South Padre Island

Dentist Nightmare

Redfish Portrait

First Post

I invited Johnny Q., http://www.johnnyquiroz.com/Site/JohnnyQuiroz.html, and his friend, Walter, to go fishing with me on last Wednesday. Johnny guides on the rivers of Texas and has had a stint guiding in Alaska.
The weather report said a light north wind in the morning, dying mid-day, then a slight south breeze in the afternoon with temperatures in the low 80’s and nothing but sunshine. In other words, perfect, and this time the weather person got it right.

I launched the Maverick HPX-T at the Arroyo and turned the key, …nothing. The battery was dead. I had inadvertently left the battery switch on and a navigation light ran it down. I was 40 minutes away from my house and they were to arrive to meet me any minute. I have always carried a pull rope in the boat but, over the years, I have never needed to use it. Could a Yamaha 70 HP motor be started with a pull rope? A cold engine?

Three pulls and the engine came to life. I told my friends that this could only mean that something good was going to happen out on the water.

As we left the Arroyo River and entered the bay, I skimmed over water that was a bit shallower than I expected. We made it “over the hump” and headed to an east location where I had seen good numbers of fish a few days before and the water would be a bit deeper, just enough to allow me to pole the boat. At first I was disappointed that we had not pushed a single fish where I expected them to be. I shut down in about a foot of water that was gin clear, hoping I would pole us into the fish that should be there.

We let Walter up on the bow first as this was his first experience sight fishing. He has not been “converted” to fly fishing, yet, give us a little time. Almost immediately, I spotted the first fish. He cast to the fish and on the third cast he came tight to a very fat 23 inch redfish. A great start but I was unprepared for what we saw the rest of the day. Redfish began to appear all around us as singles and groups up to about 20 fish. There were fish tailing and large groups pushing wakes in every direction. And, as if that wasn’t enough, they were aggressive. One fish actually raced 4 feet to get to the fly and eat. Over the course of about 6 hours, we saw what we estimated to be a hundred redfish. It was as if every redfish in the bay decided to have a convention at this location.

I will let the photo’s tell the rest of the story. We had a blast.