2021 Salty H20 Fishing Thread Part II

[glen]

Anyone in Rockport area want to go about 1 today holler. Just bring ice if you want to box anything

[fish4food]

^^^Would take you up on that offer sir, but I’ve got something going on at 1400.

Made a quick trip this morning with the wife. She had trouble waking up.
Got in the water around 0730, out at 0900.

Tide was WAY out and ripping through a cut. Standing in shin deep water, casting into cut about waist deep. I caught about 15, she caught about 10. Most were 15-16. She caught 1 that was bout 18”.

Planning a fish fry so we started keeping a few.

[Full Throttle]

2021 Salty H20 Fishing Thread Part II

Drove 6 hours to fish poc area Thursday-Saturday w a buddy. My middle son Ryan didn’t have class at A&M Friday so he drove down to fish as well. Thursday afternoon we got out there around 2:30 which was the tail end of a falling tide. Waded a reef that usually has fish on it this time of year. Caught 2 keepers and a handful of throwbacks.

Thursday morning we found em thick and boxed our 3 man limit in pretty short order on variety of paddle tails. DSL White ice probably pulled in the most.

This is where the trip went south. After lunch we headed 10 miles across the bay to search for reds. About 3/4 of the way there, we blew the lower unit on my boat somehow. After trolling back for 2-3 hours and the sun fading fast, I finally swallowed some pride and flagged down a commercial fisherman for help and got a tow the rest of the way back.

Saturday we used the trolling motor to go out a mile or so to wade a few nearby reefs but not much biting. Only caught a handful of throwbacks.

Good times on the beautiful Texas coast!

[fish4food]

Fished the 4th with the wife. Again took a bit longer to wake up. Got to the area we wanted to fish, and someone was there. We fished around him and caught a few dink’s. He was wearing them out.
We walked behind him to go into the slew that was draining, and he waived us in. I politely declined and thanked him. We moved in and didn’t catch anything. He finally packed up and moved out, so we got in there behind him.
Caught maybe 20 between the 2 of us, most being 13-16”. I released a limit cause I’m tired of cleaning fish. Well wife finally landed a keeper and strings it. Dang it. Only caught 2 more keepers after that.
Had a dang sting ray follow me around while wading. Tried moving it off with my rod, it’s go away, then circle back to me.

Fished yesterday morning with a buddy on his boat. First spot we fished was a flat with a gut that tapered off. Wife caught 3 dink flounder. Nothing else. Moved to another place further into the bay. Drifted across a large flat and started catching redfish. Boat landed 10-15. I only caught 2 and lost 2. Wife caught 5-6. Buddy and his wife the rest. Kept 4.

[DUKFVR]

Congrats Everyone! Nice fish!

[AtTheWall]

Pompano are making a show along PINS right now.

Glen and I have been making a few runs, when I can do so, and at the top of last week - surf water temp at 72 degrees the day after the winds shifted from NE to SE with 1ft surf - clear water conditions with the nearshore wade gut, running South to North (reversed from the NE pattern) = POMP WINDOW!

Glen caught a solid Pomp window on Monday last week.

Saturday - we rolled PINs - tide was 1.2ft lower than normal at low - water was way out. This sets up good driving to the zone we have been working 20(s) Little to Big Shell transition with shell, ghost shrimp breathing holes in the sand and coquina clams and shorebirds who eat them.

Then the job of reading the surf and finding the holes between the wade gut and out the the 3rd bar with a rip, working the Southern side of these holes, the outflow - setup just to the North of the outflow and find a zone in the near breakers that show a hole - water that is at least a half foot or more deeper than the sandbar on the south side where the rip is running against breakers.

The setup location is so tight, Glen and I stopped at our last place for the day. I was parked 10 yards to Glen's south, on the rip tide current outflow - Glen had two rods 20 yards to my North. He hammered Pomps and I had nothing. Moved 40 yards to my North above Glen - POMPS.

Just a few yards - staring at the surf and sand - you really have to work sections in areas - where these fish are feeding and holding in little pockets between the bars and cuts.

Glen was wading out to his neck to the 2nd bar and dumping shrimp/ Fishbite combos on his leaders (spinning rod helps lob and not knock off the hooked dead shrimp on the toss).

I was casting long rods and could hit the 3rd standing on the 1st - but those long bombed cast blew the shrimp off literally every cast and the few that did make the ride out there, picked up black drum and pomps. So I stopped using shrimp and simply went colored Fishbites with colored hook floats, #4 Owner light wire circle hooks (tandem drop rig) using 3 - 4 oz spider weights.

Without the Spiderweight, the current and seaweed would blow up a leader with junk and pomp will not touch anything - like trout - with weed on the bait.

So areas along Big Shell and down into the 38 mm range Saturday - the Sea weed was so bad, folks ended up where we usually chase pomps - which creates a challenge in finding setups that aren't pre-occupied by others with the same pursuits.

We finished the day boxing black drum, pomps and some bull whiting that measured 18" - too large not to box and fry some tasty whiting filets with the little slot black drum.

Pomp will sushi - SO DARN GOOD TO EAT!

Glen and son last Monday PINS




I didn't snag any fish LDPs from Saturday but here's Glen with a 20" class pompano when we finally found a pattern where we could at least hope for a pomp every 20 - 30 minutes. Glen got bit off a few times so we think sharks and or bluefish are running behind the tons of fingerling mullet swimming to Mexico in the surf zone.

Water temp in the surf Saturday - 69 degrees

Pomp love 68 - 75 degree surf. They will bite down to around 64 before shutting down into winter windows of less reliability as the water temps drop.








With the water conditions so clean, I waded a bit flinging the classic surf location lure (Johnson Sprite 3/4 oz Silver spoon - with a custom white/chartreuse treble hook for extra color and action = nothing.

Nothing picked up fresh fingerling mullet either - cut and or whole - including a hardhead. So cut bait and bullreds = NATHA. Which is odd this time of the year but, the bullreds could of been working outside the 3rd - I made two long cut mullet soaks over the 3rd but seaweed was literally impossible to manage without focusing only on that stick and ignoring the pompano setups. So Pompano was the focus - the window is closing for them this year so it was the goal.

[gigem95]

Drove 6 hours to fish poc area Thursday-Saturday w a buddy. My middle son Ryan didn’t have class at A&M Friday so he drove down to fish as well. Thursday afternoon we got out there around 2:30 which was the tail end of a falling tide. Waded a reef that usually has fish on it this time of year. Caught 2 keepers and a handful of throwbacks.

Thursday morning we found em thick and boxed our 3 man limit in pretty short order on variety of paddle tails. DSL White ice probably pulled in the most.

This is where the trip went south. After lunch we headed 10 miles across the bay to search for reds. About 3/4 of the way there, we blew the lower unit on my boat somehow. After trolling back for 2-3 hours and the sun fading fast, I finally swallowed some pride and flagged down a commercial fisherman for help and got a tow the rest of the way back.

Saturday we used the trolling motor to go out a mile or so to wade a few nearby reefs but not much biting. Only caught a handful of throwbacks.

Good times on the beautiful Texas coast!

Dang. Any idea what you hit?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Mayhem]

That’s a lot of words to say we caught a bunch of pompano in the surf.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Quackerbox]

Ehhhhh n/m

[AtTheWall]

That’s a lot of words to say we caught a bunch of pompano in the surf.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Yup - hate to type to share here at times cuz the peanut gallery of recent years has really changed. Detailing what works and the context of what some of us who have shared here, with more than stories and success pixels - some have learned and embraced the details, of the techniques used, to consistently catch fish on days like this. And these members do not share their thanks on the PUBLIC boards openly, but many have transitioned to the coast, with some of the knowledge gleaned and shared here.

Lotta folks fish that don't share what they are doing here - because of this.

I could care less - I just do what I do and catch fish - share a bit - and continue to make memories and friends - who pursue gamefish.





Thanks!

Rob

[Full Throttle]

Dang. Any idea what you hit?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

No idea. Small dime sized piece chunk missing from skeg but never felt or heard anything

[AtTheWall]

And Quakerbox - wanna see one of my STAKE OUT POLES working HARD about 100lbs -straight down around 25 Fathoms.


Upside down no less - bound to XPLODE - power applied to snap it


STAKE OUT POLE FOR THE WIN and most importantly - GOOD FRIENDS LIMITED OUT ON SOLID CLASS YFT!

Note the power zone in the blank - off the boats hull and held out with lift.

You learn more about tackle with THIS than any other test.

[Quackerbox]

I'm FLATTERED

Sent from my SM-G970U using Tapatalk

[fish4food]

:d :d :d

[easeup]

Yup - hate to type to share here at times cuz the peanut gallery of recent years has really changed. Detailing what works and the context of what some of us who have shared here, with more than stories and success pixels - some have learned and embraced the details, of the techniques used, to consistently catch fish on days like this. And these members do not share their thanks on the PUBLIC boards openly, but many have transitioned to the coast, with some of the knowledge gleaned and shared here.
.........................................

Thanks!

Rob

well thanks to all that will type all of the how to detail because guys like me at the high end of the Red River dont get to go to the salt very often. We need lots of help every time on how to have some level of success down there so it aint a wasted trip till next year deal.

the look at me post with LDPs dont do much to help.
so thanks to all the TBH brothers willing to help us out.