Fall..!! It conjures up images of struggles with broad shouldered bronze beasts in skinny waters, cool dry mornings, fast moving grey missiles we call dove and of course the arrival of some of my favorite feathered friends, geese, ducks and sandhill cranes. Its just a wonderful time to be alive and living in South Texas.
Our dove populations in this area are some of the best I've seen and the few times we haven't got our limits were not due to lack of birds. We are inundated with pintails, redheads and teal right now. But, our main focus has been on the redfish. And oh what a great time we are having.
Many calm cool mornings have greeted us as we head out each day. The reds are ganging up in shallow water chasing shrimp and blue crabs. Flocks of hungry seagulls have pointed the way for us to the pods of tailing reds as they forage across the flats.
These sights and sounds just never get old for me and I feel like a kid again each morning as soon as I spot the first V-wakes a fleeing shrimp or other telltale signs.
Our tactics have varied from the usual topwaters and paddletail plastics and spoons to various plastics rigged under maulers and tiny curl tail grubs rigged weightless and weedless to get into the heavy grass.
Most days we are seeing many small groups of redfish but so far no large schools. Our catch rates are fair to good and we seem to manage a few reds on even our worst day. On the good days we are catching and releasing numerous oversize reds and easy limits of chunky keepers. Our redfish numbers seem to be in excellent shape and the fishing pressure is minimal with lots of folks turning their attention to hunting.
I have a ton of pics and videos from the past two or three weeks and will put some of the more memorable ones up on this post. Suffice it to say we have been doing well down south and with the first real cold front blowing outside as I type this, it looks to get even better.
I had two good friends come down from Mississippi for three days to chase a few redfish. Roy and Winston came prepared to wade, drift or whatever it took to to get their line stretched. Roy struck first with this solid keeper.
A short video of the landing. Seems my video skills are getting worse instead of better, but I'm having fun LOL.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6A5b7ZN8yU
Roy, Winston and I chased little schools of reds around for the best part of two days before I came down with a really bad upper respiratory infection which put me out of commission for three days. Winston had a pinched nerve in his hip that kinda put a damper on his trip as well so Roy had to do all the catching.
Everyones health was a little better on the next trip. Shane almost didn't make the trip as he had an accident in San Antonio as he was leaving town to head this way.
I guess the fishing gods felt sorry for him because the man was on fire virtually all day.
And a little video clip to go along with that.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEdg3ruEOxo
He kept up the pressure on us with chunky redfish after chunky redfish.
And another clip.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_hrlzZWlgg
The biggest fish of the day was seen but not landed. No still pics of course but some interesting video. I saved the last little bit of a long extended battle with an oversize red. Unfortunately the line parted just above the hook. At least he managed to find a little humor in the situation.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=7kSu_YEVsgA
Next up were my buddies Oscar, George and Jud. The fishing was a little slow for us but Jud did manage to carry the load with this nice redfish and several trout for the box. Gotta love the celebratory cigar LOL. Nice fish Jud.
Jeremy came next with a group of old and new friends. My buddy Norman told me that this guy was a fish catching machine. The fishing proved to be tough on these two days but as billed, Jeremy topped everyone with the big red and big trout. (They wouldn't let me play LOL)
Then came a few days with my good friends Ray and Randy. They were down to celebrate Randy's birthday(the big 5 0 ). We had spectacular conditions and theses guys know how to take full advantage. On the way to our first stop, Randy told me how its funny but usually one of them will almost always have a bang up day and the other will get almost shut out. I guess the fishing gods were listening and offered up a great birthday present for Randy.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQaAxrva2n8
And the release
Randy and I both picked up a couple of nice redfish while wading in knee deep water. They all fell for topwaters and were sightcasted.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OzBA8m6sFU
And another safe release
That evening, my BIL Bruce showed up with his kids Meagan and Travis and their brand new boat. We decided that all of us including Ray and Randy would participate in the maiden voyage and help with the break-in of the new motor.
Of course we planned to take our fishing stuff with us LOL.
We headed out at sunrise and ran the boat as instructed which took us a little longer to reach our destination than we thought. We did arrive after all the heavy boat traffic had gone through and the little flat where we had been sightcasting looked to be a little muddied up.
As we waded further onto the flat, it cleared up nicely and the reds were there! I sightcasted to two reds and got reactions but no takers. I finally went to a 4" Gambler flappin' Shad in red/white and that proved to be the ticket.
I hooked up on a solid redfish and quickly turned to find Meagan so she could reel it in. However, as I headed towards Bruce and Meagan, I saw Bruce set back hard. The pronounced bend of his rod told the story. Another big redfish on the hook.
I heard Bruce tell Meagan to reel her line in so she could fight the fish he had just hooked up. Much to our surprise, she was hooked up too!! A triple hookup. The quality of this video isn't that good because I was wading towards them with a red on my line trying to capture as much as I could of their action so be gentle with the critique LOL.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGDN66pFXZA
A great Father/Daughter moment
A short time later, Meagan was hooked up again. This time the fish was a little bigger. For a 13 year old girl on her first wade, she was making this look easy WTG girl!!
www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGDN66pFXZA
This one measured 27 7/8" and weighed 8 1/2 pounds not bad for this young lady.
Well, we headed in early so we could hook up with Capt. Jim Onderdonk www.pocolocolodge.com for an afternoon dove hunt.
We got back to the house in time to change into our hunting clothes and load Rocksy into the truck for the ride to Falfurrias. A few quick practice shots at Jim's skeet range and we were ready for some grey feathered missiles.
The ride out we saw very few birds and I have to admit I was a bit concerned. However as soon as Jim put us on our spot, it seemed as if someone turned on the light switch and the dove really started to fly.
Randy carried his hot hand at fishing over to the dove hunting and made several great shots. Ray did well too and we won't mention how Bruce did LOL.
Rocksy did great and found several downed birds that we had all but given up on. It was a fun time and a great way to end the day.
Rocksy did a great job and I think I'm really starting to like this little black dog.
A quick stop for supper in Premont at the Oasis ended our hectic day. I think we all slept well that night. Looking forward to doing it again real soon. Duck season is fast approaching and I hope to see a bunch of y'all down here.
Remember to practice conservation and just keep 5. Later, Aubrey
Our dove populations in this area are some of the best I've seen and the few times we haven't got our limits were not due to lack of birds. We are inundated with pintails, redheads and teal right now. But, our main focus has been on the redfish. And oh what a great time we are having.
Many calm cool mornings have greeted us as we head out each day. The reds are ganging up in shallow water chasing shrimp and blue crabs. Flocks of hungry seagulls have pointed the way for us to the pods of tailing reds as they forage across the flats.
These sights and sounds just never get old for me and I feel like a kid again each morning as soon as I spot the first V-wakes a fleeing shrimp or other telltale signs.
Our tactics have varied from the usual topwaters and paddletail plastics and spoons to various plastics rigged under maulers and tiny curl tail grubs rigged weightless and weedless to get into the heavy grass.
Most days we are seeing many small groups of redfish but so far no large schools. Our catch rates are fair to good and we seem to manage a few reds on even our worst day. On the good days we are catching and releasing numerous oversize reds and easy limits of chunky keepers. Our redfish numbers seem to be in excellent shape and the fishing pressure is minimal with lots of folks turning their attention to hunting.
I have a ton of pics and videos from the past two or three weeks and will put some of the more memorable ones up on this post. Suffice it to say we have been doing well down south and with the first real cold front blowing outside as I type this, it looks to get even better.
I had two good friends come down from Mississippi for three days to chase a few redfish. Roy and Winston came prepared to wade, drift or whatever it took to to get their line stretched. Roy struck first with this solid keeper.
A short video of the landing. Seems my video skills are getting worse instead of better, but I'm having fun LOL.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6A5b7ZN8yU
Roy, Winston and I chased little schools of reds around for the best part of two days before I came down with a really bad upper respiratory infection which put me out of commission for three days. Winston had a pinched nerve in his hip that kinda put a damper on his trip as well so Roy had to do all the catching.
Everyones health was a little better on the next trip. Shane almost didn't make the trip as he had an accident in San Antonio as he was leaving town to head this way.
I guess the fishing gods felt sorry for him because the man was on fire virtually all day.
And a little video clip to go along with that.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEdg3ruEOxo
He kept up the pressure on us with chunky redfish after chunky redfish.
And another clip.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_hrlzZWlgg
The biggest fish of the day was seen but not landed. No still pics of course but some interesting video. I saved the last little bit of a long extended battle with an oversize red. Unfortunately the line parted just above the hook. At least he managed to find a little humor in the situation.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=7kSu_YEVsgA
Next up were my buddies Oscar, George and Jud. The fishing was a little slow for us but Jud did manage to carry the load with this nice redfish and several trout for the box. Gotta love the celebratory cigar LOL. Nice fish Jud.
Jeremy came next with a group of old and new friends. My buddy Norman told me that this guy was a fish catching machine. The fishing proved to be tough on these two days but as billed, Jeremy topped everyone with the big red and big trout. (They wouldn't let me play LOL)
Then came a few days with my good friends Ray and Randy. They were down to celebrate Randy's birthday(the big 5 0 ). We had spectacular conditions and theses guys know how to take full advantage. On the way to our first stop, Randy told me how its funny but usually one of them will almost always have a bang up day and the other will get almost shut out. I guess the fishing gods were listening and offered up a great birthday present for Randy.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQaAxrva2n8
And the release
Randy and I both picked up a couple of nice redfish while wading in knee deep water. They all fell for topwaters and were sightcasted.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OzBA8m6sFU
And another safe release
That evening, my BIL Bruce showed up with his kids Meagan and Travis and their brand new boat. We decided that all of us including Ray and Randy would participate in the maiden voyage and help with the break-in of the new motor.
Of course we planned to take our fishing stuff with us LOL.
We headed out at sunrise and ran the boat as instructed which took us a little longer to reach our destination than we thought. We did arrive after all the heavy boat traffic had gone through and the little flat where we had been sightcasting looked to be a little muddied up.
As we waded further onto the flat, it cleared up nicely and the reds were there! I sightcasted to two reds and got reactions but no takers. I finally went to a 4" Gambler flappin' Shad in red/white and that proved to be the ticket.
I hooked up on a solid redfish and quickly turned to find Meagan so she could reel it in. However, as I headed towards Bruce and Meagan, I saw Bruce set back hard. The pronounced bend of his rod told the story. Another big redfish on the hook.
I heard Bruce tell Meagan to reel her line in so she could fight the fish he had just hooked up. Much to our surprise, she was hooked up too!! A triple hookup. The quality of this video isn't that good because I was wading towards them with a red on my line trying to capture as much as I could of their action so be gentle with the critique LOL.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGDN66pFXZA
A great Father/Daughter moment
A short time later, Meagan was hooked up again. This time the fish was a little bigger. For a 13 year old girl on her first wade, she was making this look easy WTG girl!!
www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGDN66pFXZA
This one measured 27 7/8" and weighed 8 1/2 pounds not bad for this young lady.
Well, we headed in early so we could hook up with Capt. Jim Onderdonk www.pocolocolodge.com for an afternoon dove hunt.
We got back to the house in time to change into our hunting clothes and load Rocksy into the truck for the ride to Falfurrias. A few quick practice shots at Jim's skeet range and we were ready for some grey feathered missiles.
The ride out we saw very few birds and I have to admit I was a bit concerned. However as soon as Jim put us on our spot, it seemed as if someone turned on the light switch and the dove really started to fly.
Randy carried his hot hand at fishing over to the dove hunting and made several great shots. Ray did well too and we won't mention how Bruce did LOL.
Rocksy did great and found several downed birds that we had all but given up on. It was a fun time and a great way to end the day.
Rocksy did a great job and I think I'm really starting to like this little black dog.
A quick stop for supper in Premont at the Oasis ended our hectic day. I think we all slept well that night. Looking forward to doing it again real soon. Duck season is fast approaching and I hope to see a bunch of y'all down here.
Remember to practice conservation and just keep 5. Later, Aubrey
