Not everyone will have the fondest memories of the Spring 2008 fishing season but a few will smile. It was definitely the windiest February through May in my lifetime. For a select few middle coast guides and anglers, a certain breed of baitfish saved many days from the 20-30 mph winds that became a dreaded norm last year.
Like the surf in summer, or migration of shrimp in fall, a highlight of springtime is the annual arrival of the almighty glass minnows. Silver and flashy, the darting prey arrive by the thousands to shallow flats. The birds welcome the visit with open mouths and can feed for weeks on the buffet. Speckled trout and redfish will hang near and strike the bait in an all-at-once attack. To better your chances of capitalizing on such a frenzy, be patient and wait out the arrival.
Along with Captain Kent Sabin, I was guiding a group of fishermen from Dallas and Austin that spring on what turned out to be one of, if not the windiest day of the entire season. From the word go, we were experiencing a 20mph wind from the south; which then turned around on us with a 30mph wind out of the north! The wind was making every bit of fishable water available to us muddy and we were left wondering exactly what we were going to do.
We just started heading out - and myself and the good captain were hearing from other guides that we ought to just cancel the trip! Well, we weren’t about to cancel the trip and send all these fishermen back home without having ever been on the water, so we decided to just get out there and see what we could catch.
We could see pelicans diving into the shallows of a cove along the south shore; it looked like the cove was packed with baitfish! We moved close enough to cast and got ready for what promised to be some pretty heavy mud by getting on our waders. Even though the waters were murky and the tide was starting to fall, I had an instinctive feeling that the big fish would make a move soon. We decided to mimic the glass minnows with some Brown Lures glow and chartreuse soft plastic lures - they’re ideal for these situations. I added a miniature chrome topwater and before long, we were starting to attract some attention from redfish. They started off biting slow, as they always do; but then they really started to rush in!
A patch of bait that was previously the size of a swimming pool quickly became tightly confined. Minnows flipped and bounced on the surface like popcorn. Trout were seen jolting clear out of the water in pursuit. The surface of the water boiled as piranha-like predators furiously attacked glass minnows like machines.
Usually, you’d reel in quickly keeping the lure over the surface of the water to get trout interested - but this cove was so full of them that we did better with a slow reel. To give you an idea of how well this trip went, we all caught our limits of redfish!
If you are still waiting to get out there, find the bait and don’t be afraid to stay out late. At nightfall, the bite is often just getting started.
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