October 20, 2016
A11
Island Moon
On the Rocks
Backwater Adventures and even a piece of FISH BITES for extra smell. Long drifts to find fish concentrations, then zero in on where the best action is. Sometimes in the Lagoon pin perch will attack the shrimp so fast it’s not worth the trouble. Move to areas with less grass and you will see a reduction in pin perch, the rocks of Baffin are probably your best bet. We always find a varied mixed bag of fish when we use live shrimp, enjoyable after a whole summer of catching mostly trout. When the water temperatures drop into the 70’s trout and reds will explode on top water baits! If your area is void of floating grass tickle a top water over the surface at first light. This time of year I like a smaller high pitch rattle, sounds more like a shad. After the sun comes up, switch over to soft plastics. The next few months as fish start to regulate their body temperatures soft plastics will let anglers cover a bunch of water, match the bait they are feeding on, and spend more time fishing and less time re-baiting. Every species of baitfish is flowing through the bays right now, and most of them are not sold at bait stands. As bait fishermen we use very few species as bait. Gamefish are feeding in glass minnows, shad, ballyhoo, mud minnows and chubs, we can match that with our lure selection. I chose the DOA LURE LINE because it’s all proven designs with matching jig heads and the color selection is limitless. The 3”CAL SHADS are the small and lifelike imitation of all the baitfish we have. Many times the difference in effectiveness is the one or two inches in lure size. When the bite is on I like to switch to the big 5” jerk shad, and when shad are present the DOA AIRHEAD. Vary your presentation between bumping the bottom, double pump and retrieve. Gamefish follow the lunar feeding tables and I change my presentation to match their level of aggression. The edges of the ICW are about to light up with activity. As the migration of baitfish starts to slow down the shrimp will be on the move and following the ICW like a highway. Start off along the edges working soft plastics first thing in the morning and I can guarantee you a tight line. While the live baits we have all been using will work and even excel, change is here. The availability of the popular live baits will be tough to find on the weekend so relax and just go fishing. Catches have been outstanding and I’ve been working hard on all my duck blinds getting ready for another winter duck season. Seasons are changing and I’m not the only one that’s ready! Follow all our adventures on FACEBOOK AT JOEY FARAHS FISHING! Go get wet......
By Joey Farah Farah’s Fishing Adventures We are in times of change in both the rhythm of nature and fishing techniques. For the last four months most fisherman have been focused on bait fishing, mainly live croaker and piggy perch. As the days of fall lead us closer to winter these baits become h a r d e r for bait providers to catch, a n d Big Reds are still easy to find in b e c o m e the Laguna Madre’ especially l e s s effective. on windy afternoons. O u r migrations of baitfish have poured masses of baitfish towards our passes and brought a congregation of gamefish following them. In the weeks to come don’t get in a panic when you find a change in bait opportunities at the dock, go back to the basics! Some of my earliest success came from using small mullet caught in cast nets. These hardy baitfish have a certain odor that makes them attractive both dead and alive. Anglers can catch them or buy them from the marinas, fresh is always better than frozen. Using a slip weight on the main line and a swivel to stop it before the leader is the best way to fish them. Hooking the mullet in the back will keep the bait swimming in circles, the bottom half will swim towards the surface and over the grass. Hooking them through the chin and up out of the top of the nose will let them swim strait in heavy current. Sometimes fresh cut or sliced finger mullet will bring more attention than live ones. I like a 4# circle hook when fishing finger mullet. Drifting with them under a popping cork will also work well. It’s back! Live shrimp and popping corks are a Texas tradition. Different styles of corks and depth of presentation are all part of testing your wits against the fish. Colored beads? Rattles? Foam or plastic? Gather up a few different set-ups and see what works. For me it is the time tested use of foam or cork floats, 30lb leader material with a #4 circle hook. I like to keep my leaders a bit long and always use a split shot to keep the bait down. I will add a small bead in dirty water
By Jay Gardner Work took me to the beaches of South Padre and Cameron County this past week. I was apprehensive about the red tide reports, but we headed off at the crack-o-chicken of 5am and pointed the truck south. As we crossed the Queen Isabella Causeway, I could see the tell-tale slicks and smell the offensive red tide signature, and worried about the beach. I will give the smell about 2 out of 10 (realizing that I’m pretty sensitive to the stuff). T h a n k f u l l y, once across the causeway, the smell diminished and was absent the rest of the day. One thing I noticed immediately, and throughout the day, that there were no mullet jumping in the 5lb flounder surf. I know, I looked a lot. In addition, I didn’t see any little pompano, jacks, or whiting at the edge of the surf. You can ALWAYS see some little fish cruising the edge of the water, almost independent of season, unless one thing happens: they’re all killed by red tide and not there. There were no birds working out at the color change (which was dismal anyway), and nothing really going on. The wind had shifted and was coming out of the south to south west, which had the winds coming straight up the pipe along the beach. This made a nice 3 knot current running south the north. The water was obviously kind of beat up, and the clarity was lacking for what we usually get to experience in south Padre. This same water is headed our way as I type this.
the plovers eat. It’s the same thing with storm displaced birds; when the tide is high on the beach, they move to the upper reaches of the back side of the Island and wait it out. Beachcombing was quite disappointing. Shelling was mediocre at best. There were no red mangrove seeds, which I had hoped to find. They’re about the size of a No. 2 pencil, although a little fatter at the base and slightly curved. As they are bright green, they typically stick out like a sore thumb. I only saw one black mangrove seed, and it was cut in half. An inspection on the backside of the Island on the way out let me know that the black mangroves have not begun dropping their seeds yet, although the trees are full of them. The water had been going to the base of the dunes, just as it has been around here. Usually this lines all the flotsam up nicely, making beach combing an easy thing, as well as making driving a dream during low tide. However, the more I looked at the wrack line, the more I saw skeletons and spines of dead fish along the base of the dunes. As I was barefoot at the time (don’t tell OSHA on me), I quickly decided that I didn’t need to be fooling around up there. Please be aware of similar conditions here locally. Don’t let the kids or the dogs wander around at the base of the dunes due to spines in the feet, and because I did see a relatively fresh dead southern stargazer. These fish died because of lethal levels of red tide toxin in their systems, and if the dog eats a portion of the fish,
Sharkathon crew - Mickey, Willie, Tyler and me
The shorebirds were the usual suspects, with laughing gulls, sanderlings, and willets being the primary inhabitants. I was very surprised to not see any piping plovers, or snowy plovers for that fact. I’m guessing due to the range in tides from the base of the dunes at night to all the way down towards mean low water during the day that those particular birds were on the backside of the Island during our visit. When tides have a large range like that, the mud flats on the backside of the Island are flooded, and then exposed on a daily basis. This really jump starts the worms and fly larvae (gross!) that
they could also get sick and potentially die. Sorry for the doom and gloom report folks. BUT! By the time this hits your hands, we should have received our second little front for the season. While I don’t appreciate the winds, I DO appreciate the slight drop in temperature, especially at night. It’s easier on the electric bill for sure. Flounder should be running soon, and I nailed a decent one the other day in the skiff. But I’m hoping that it will kick off the beach fishing in high gear, and if it does, I’ll see you loyal readers On the Rocks.
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