I don’t often get up before sunrise, but I have to take advantage of those moments when the wind isn’t blowing if I stand any chance of finding the pod of tailing redfish that I’m seeking. There was a 4 hour window on Saturday and I was able to launch the kayak a half hour after dawn.
There was a lot of baitfish activity in the first hour after sunrise, and I hooked one nice trout casting around the edges of a patch of nervous water, the first fish I’ve landed while sitting in the boat. The water was too deep to get out at that spot and the trout towed me around a bit.
The next five hours were a slow search for fish on the flats. I didn’t spot a single one until I beached the kayak on the island right next to Packery Channel as the winds came up around noon. I could make it the short distance across the channel in the 20 mph crosswind if it got that bad, and there was a fishy looking stretch of grass flat next to a drop-off of white sand. There were many schools of mullet darting about and I saw three or four sheepshead, always too close to cast to. There was one little redfish that nosed his way into the silt cloud I was kicking up, but no shots to be had.
The winds are a solid 15-20 mph today and they aren’t predicted to drop below 15 mph until Thursday afternoon. I was going to head back south to Padre Island at Bird Island Basin, but the water there is mostly thigh/waist deep and not as favorable to sight casting as Redfish Bay. I’ll go back to Port Aransas to fish off the Jetty as the SE winds are OK for casting, and it isn’t too crowded mid-week. Despite tax day being pretty painful last week, I did do some retail therapy and bought a 10 weight for the chance encounter with tarpon and big jacks, so I’d better get on it.
TRAVELINGWITHTOOLS 