This is my first post on this blog, so allow me to introduce myself. My name is Jeremy Chavez (or JP as many people call me). I have been part of the blogosphere for years now and my current blog venture can be found at www.castingtales.wordpress.com. I am a sight fishing/redfish addict who resides in Southeast Texas. Most, if not all, of my leisure time is spent on the water; the bulk of that time is spent with my hindquarters planted firmly on a polyethylene boat in one of the many mud pits, i.e. marshes, up and down the Texas coastline. I am currently rummaging the market for a skiff to add to my never-ending arsenal fishing-related toys.
With civilities out of the way here is some fishy content to satisfy your angling palate…
Fishing around a full moon has always given me fits. Couple that with the recent heat wave blasting Texas and you will soon understand why fishing the marsh under the moonlight sounded like a good idea. What I have learned over the years fishing around a full moon is that the bite is consistently inconsistent. One month the fish are feeding at first light and the next month they’re feeding midday. The tidal swings are at their greatest each month in the periods around the new and full moons, but it’s anyone’s guess which tide cycle they will feed on.
Last Saturday Mark and I decided to use his boat to ferry our kayaks to a new area. The area looked similar to other spots that have traditional produced during the summer months. The area is near deep water and has reefs scattered throughout. The plan was to get there at night and fish into the early morning hours. The only issue with running at night was neither of us knew how to run the boat while dodging all the obstructions the randomly dispersed oysters created. I woke up at 12:30am after an hour nap and met Mark a little after 1:00am. We made it to the ramp about an hour and a half later. We decided to take it slow running into the area. After running aground and Mark getting turned around a few times we made it to our destination around 3:30am.
Full moon fishing…
The water was low but the tide was coming in strong. The low water and darkness made it difficult to navigate because we kept running over shallow reefs in our kayaks. We made several drifts and spooked a few fish but we didn’t land any fish. The wind blew hard all night and never diminished as predicted. Before first light I paddled to a protected shoreline and started fishing. As the sky started changing colors I started hearing fish crash all around me. I threw a topwater and got a few takers, but mostly small fish. I kept paddling over fish that were pushing big wakes, but I only managed to catch small fish. Reds were backing and busting bait everywhere. Mark made his way over to the area I was in and he experienced much of the same. He caught a few small reds and one slot on topwaters. I lost count how many small reds we caught. They must have been a dime a dozen. I kept moving and spotted and caught several more small fish throwing a weedless TTF Flats Minnow again most were small.
I spotted some birds working about a half mile away to the north. I paddled over to find several schools of redfish crashing the surface. I put down my rod and pick up my camera after I caught a few more fish on a shrimp fly. I followed the schools around enjoying and capturing the show. One school swam straight at me and several of the fish in the school bumped into my legs as I was sitting side-saddle taking photos.
Sunday, Raymond decided to tag along with me after backing out on the trip the day before. We decided to stay closer to home because we had to be off the water early. We got on the water about at 5:45 and fished until 11:00. The tide was lower than I expected and near wintertime lows but we managed to find small slot reds in the remaining water crashing on shrimp. I caught one fish on a shrimp fly and the rest were caught on a TTF Flats Minnow.
