Well, it was a good birthday! I had my redfish limit by 9 AM this morning, with a real monster thrown in for good measure. I had been working in Brazoria County on Wednesday, so decided to call Tim and see if he wanted to do a quick overnight trip to Mad Island Marsh. He obliged after hearing that Mad Island Lake was "full of redfish" although reported to be somewhat picky. Yesterday evening it was as reported, with lots of fish but few takers of our artificial offerings. So we decided to have a few beers on the deck, enjoy a beautiful sunset and call it a night, dreaming of the big ones in the morning. And we were not dissapointed. We started paddling our kayaks around 6:30 this morning, headed west in the marsh. As we got near the west end of the main lake, I looked over and saw some birds working furiously about 1/4 mile ahead. I quickly waved Tim to head that way and sure enough when we got there the reds were feeding under the birds. Tim and I made our first casts of the morning, both hooking up with quality fish. Mine turned out to be 24" and Tim's broke off
at the last minute due to some line management issues. I picked up one more red around 20" on a topwater and then the bite began to die. I suggested we ease towards the next marsh lake in an area were we have found fish before. On the way I picked up a 23" red blind casting near an oyster reef. We slipped into the next lake and sure enough found fish working. Having my limit, I tried to focus on getting Tim on a good fish. He made a nice cast to a tailing fish and bam, fish on. I could tell he was a good fish and told Tim to "let him have some room". We got the fish up closer to the boat and I told Tim it looked oversize to me. Tim decided to use the tag on this one after landing succesfully. Fish continued to tail and chase bait all around us and I couldn't stand it any longer, making a cast to a tail not more than 30' from my kayak. My Gulp shrimp hit the water and bam, fish on. I could tell right away that I had another oversize. Little did I realize how big this fish really was until a couple more minutes into the epic battle. This poor fish was so big and in such shallow water that he was having a hard time fighting back because his body was partly out of the water most of the time and little room to go deep. I pull him in the kayak, barely able to pick this brute up. By this time it is about 10 AM and I tell Tim I am going to ease back to the lodge and let him fish some more. We end up taking pictures and cleaning our redfish, heading back to Victoria around 1. What a great day! The marsh is always full of surprises--
at the last minute due to some line management issues. I picked up one more red around 20" on a topwater and then the bite began to die. I suggested we ease towards the next marsh lake in an area were we have found fish before. On the way I picked up a 23" red blind casting near an oyster reef. We slipped into the next lake and sure enough found fish working. Having my limit, I tried to focus on getting Tim on a good fish. He made a nice cast to a tailing fish and bam, fish on. I could tell he was a good fish and told Tim to "let him have some room". We got the fish up closer to the boat and I told Tim it looked oversize to me. Tim decided to use the tag on this one after landing succesfully. Fish continued to tail and chase bait all around us and I couldn't stand it any longer, making a cast to a tail not more than 30' from my kayak. My Gulp shrimp hit the water and bam, fish on. I could tell right away that I had another oversize. Little did I realize how big this fish really was until a couple more minutes into the epic battle. This poor fish was so big and in such shallow water that he was having a hard time fighting back because his body was partly out of the water most of the time and little room to go deep. I pull him in the kayak, barely able to pick this brute up. By this time it is about 10 AM and I tell Tim I am going to ease back to the lodge and let him fish some more. We end up taking pictures and cleaning our redfish, heading back to Victoria around 1. What a great day! The marsh is always full of surprises--
1 comment:
And to think that I sat by the phone waiting for a call all night long.
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