POC - 9/14 & 9/15

Lets just say the reds are schooling up big time...

My son-n-law and two of his friends fished on our kayaks at Pt. O'Connor on Friday and Saturday. On Friday, the winds were light and boat traffic wasn't too bad. We paddled across the ICW and started fishing the grass flats from right across the ICW to approx. 1-1/2 miles from ICW. We hit 4 or 5 different flats and each held schooling redfish. On the first flat, I was blindcasting and had 3 slot reds on 3 casts. The real show was on the last flat we tried. We came across a school of reds that probably held over a 100 redfish. The water was so clear, you could see the sea of red moving across the flat. We chased the fish down the flat, catching and releasing. It was really a blast to sit and watch a 100 reds swimming around you, under you, etc. We fished till about noon, then headed back for a quick rest before heading out for the afternoon.

Friday afternoon we took a drive to Charlie's bait camp and paddled across the ICW. The tide was low, grass extremely thick and the fish didn't cooperate. We did see some tailing fish, but was difficult to get to them with all the grass.

Saturady morning, we were greated with brisk winds and somewhat off-colored water, so we weren't able to spot the schools as easy as Friday and the boat traffic was heavy. However, the redfish were still on the flats and it was not an issue to catch and release all that you wanted.

Sorry I have no pictures as I had left the camera behind.

I did test a new bait and it was the top catcher by far. A couple of weeks ago, at Bass Pro, I purchased the new Mann's Waker. They only had a few of the freshwater models, so I bought the American Shad color. This is a topwater crankbait and the reds would just slam it. Behind this bait, the other popular baits were TopDog Jr's and Spook Jr's.. As long as the bait was flashy it didn't really matter on color, but fish were caught on silver sides, bone, pink, chartruese. I also caught a lot of reds and small trout with soft plastic under a modified mauler. The only thing was the reds caught under the mauler seemed to be undersized or on the small size of the slot, while all of my largest fish were caught on the Waker.

For you trout guys, the trout fishing was slow, we did pick-up a few each day, but the largest was only 17". The reds ranged all the way up to one at 29-1/2 and a few 27 to 28 with most running 20 to 25.

If you get a chance, I highly recommend to get out this time of year, as the reds are really schooled up on the flats.