Delacroix, LA 4-26-2020
Wind: 5-10 mph early, gradually increased to 15 mph from NNW by 8 a.m.
Tide: rising all morning to a high of 1.8 ft at 4 p.m. based on Shell Beach Station
Water Level: normal and rising
Water Temperature: 76 F
Water Clarity: very clean in the marsh ponds
Water salinity: fresh
Weather/sky: cloudy at dawn and turned sunny and clear after 9 a.m.
Temperature: 70 degrees F, up to ~82 F for high
Moon: new, waxing
Solunar period: minor period at 9-10 a.m., major period 4-6 p.m.
Launch in and out: slipped the Hobie Compass in by combat launch off Highway 300 about 6:30 am, out at 4:30 p.m.
Water covered: ~ 5 miles
Other fishers: Kevin A.
Gear: One #8 fly rod, crab nets
Lures: Rich Waldner’s classic spoon fly
Strategy/ patterns: sight cast to redfish with spoon fly, put out baited crab nets and try to dip net the crabs
Sunday’s forecast was for a nice sunny day and winds under 10 mph. I talked with my buddy Kevin and we made a plan for flyfishing. When we got to the launch at dawn there were clouds that were streaming rain off in the distance. The wind was blowing at least 10 mph to start the trip. The clouds vanished pretty quickly and gave way to a beautiful day except for that dirty old nemesis of the fly fisher that goes by the four-letter word of “WIND.”
A couple of weeks ago I fished this area and saw lots of nice sized crabs, so I thought I would bait a few crab nets and try to catch some with a dip net. On the way out I crossed paths with a tailing redfish about 30 feet away. It gulped down the spoon fly and I got it into the soft cooler bag. I had broken my favorite fly rod getting a redfish out of some weeds two weeks ago, so I was trying out a new rod that I bought from a friend for $25. It’s a nice 9.5 ft. Albright 8 weight, but I found it has a slower and more willowy action after fishing with it. After catching this redfish I learned that the rod is not so good for getting fish out of the weeds. I think I’ll bring my 10 weight rod when I fish this aquatic jungle.
Back to the crab nets. I baited them with turkey necks and spaced them about 20 yards apart and then fished. I came back and “ran” them about 2 hours later – no action. I checked and pulled them in about 1 p.m. and still nothing, although it looked like a couple of them had been picked at a bit. I saw a few crabs in the ponds during the morning, but not nearly as many as there was the last time. They seem to have migrated away. I tried to dip a few with the net, caught one but it escaped as I was sorting the muck out of the net, captured a decent one, and then missed a couple. My crabbing skills are weak, but I’ll work on it. Later in the day I spotted a lot of crabs in about a foot of water but I didn’t feel like playing with them by that point. Seems they had migrated to more shallow water as level was now higher. By that time my mind was stuck on catching redfish.
I was standing and sight fishing and seeing some fish, but they were seeing me too. I had a group of three redfish moving around a point and coming right at me. I made a short cast to them and the bigger one made a swipe at the spoon fly but missed. This mildly spooked the group, but they quickly settled down and I got a 20” redfish out of the gang.
The wind picked up and it became more difficult to pole the kayak around. It was slow, noisy, and awkward going upwind and, when standing, too fast and risking a fall going downwind. I was largely restricted to poling crosswise to the wind.
Things were slow for a while. I plodded around a pond for a while and saw a few fish but they were wary and spotted me easily. After I picked up my crab nets I opted for a change and tried to find the fish in more shallow areas. I found a little island with about a 10 foot wide cut between it and a large bank. The water was only a foot deep and it was very weedy, with the wind pushing through the cut. I saw a flash of an orange redfish feeding and put down the stake pole. I cast into the cut a few times with no action and then a nice upper sized slot redfish came out toward me. It came so close that it was hard to cast to it at such close range. It made a swing and a miss at the spoon fly and went back into the cut, so I cast in after it. But instead of getting the larger redfish I got a little 14” redfish. The bigger one left, but it gave me a clue that the fish were in shallower water.
I moved over to a new area of ponds and it wasn’t long until I started spotting fish. The water here was only a foot to a foot and a half deep, and this was where the crabs had gone. The downside was that the wind was blowing 15 mph with higher gusts and it was hard to maneuver and cast to them. I finally got the spoon fly in front of one, hooked it, and it took off under the clouds of aquatic weeds and algae. I tried to keep pressure on the fish but it had wound around the weeds so much that it created a slack line and escaped. I repeated this a few more times. I was spotting fish and getting them to eat, but then losing them to the weeds after about a 30 second battle. The new rod was too flexible to put much pressure on the fish. The afternoon proved very fruitful in that I finally was seeing fish, but with the wind and shallow weedy conditions, it was hard to hook and land them.
The last fish I caught was fun. I spotted it and it didn’t spot me since I was behind it. I moved in range, got a good cast to it and it automatically ate the fly. It tried the “bury in the weeds trick” but I tracked it down and got to it before it shook free. It was a really orange one of about 26”. I let it go to be caught another day.
I was poling in about 2 feet of weedy water when something exploded under me. By the time I could realize what had happened I looked at the front of the big wake moving away from me and saw a huge alligator gar that was about 6’ long with a girth about as thick as my waist. Always interesting stuff to see in the marsh!
#hobiefishing #hobiecompass #buff #redfish #flyfishing #kayak
Wind: 5-10 mph S
