Bruised Shoulders to Follow — September 4, 2007
Man, I have to shake the water out of my hair to get near the keyboard. We have been absolutely inundated with rainstorms this summer. The bay has received a number of ‘flushing’ rain events and with a healthy agricultural crop this year the songbirds are everywhere. With the coming of the Cast & Blast season, Teddy and Dad have been walking around using Gold Bond on the old trigger finger—and we always thought the ‘itchy’ trigger finger was something of folklore. Driving through the ranch and farm country is like taking a trip through an ornithologist, I will keep it G-rated here for our younger readers, dream come true. Simply driving from the Harlingen airport, I limited out with the car grill on mourning dove. As with the fishing season, the dove season is looking to be one of the best on record–hopefully, after last year’s questionable bird season :(.
Dad and Steven are still on the tarpon. We have landed quite a few more and are still seeing numbers of first timers get their first tarpon. Perfect for fly-rodders: the average sized tarpon is in the 40 to 100 pound range. As for me, I am still taking it easy and licking the wounds left over from July. I did man up and go out with Dad and Admiral Lamar Lawson last week and played boat captain. Lamar landed his first Texas poon but we will keep his comments and the begging and pleading that ensued during the fight to a minimal.
Ted, being the trout snob he is, has kept himself contained to the bay. Last week, he caught a great summer time speck over 29 inches and around 7 ½ pounds. Teddy still prefers his Cajun pepper on a 16th ounce jig head worked slowly over the tops of the grass. Trout are holding in the waist to chest deep water along winding grasslines and being very aggressive. Top water bites are early and late. However, the trout are being aggressive and readily hitting any top water color thrown to them.
Red fish, as I am often quoted as saying ‘Are red fish.’ Look for shallow tails early along exposed shorelines and as the afternoon warms up follow nervous bait and the mullet line. We still have rather large sized reds in the bay with a number of oversized being caught on a weekly basis. With that said, one of our closest lodge friends caught a star tagged red this week. She wins a new truck, trailer, boat, and motor. Who says fishing doesn’t pay? ;D ;D ;D
On another conservation note, the [url=http://www.nwf.org]National Wildlife Federation[/url] has invited me to DC to lobby for our wildlife habitat and wildlife populations. The NWF has received a large grant to battle the effects of global warming on wildlife. They are currently trying to raise a few hundred thousand signatures to petition Congress to get off their rears and do something about the detrimental effects to our environment. To learn more and sign the Hunter/Anglers Pledge, no money is required, log on to [url=http://www.targetglobalwarming.com]www.targetglobalwarming.org[/url].
Dad and I also ask you guys to please check out our forum. We welcome your input on our trophy trout book–who knows your picture may even grace the pages…god knows it cannot be filled with Teddy and dad’s smiling mugs.
Until next week, kiss your wife, hug your kids, and catch and release a fish!
