September 25-26, 2012

Location: Galveston North Jetty and Pelican Island Bridge
Air Temp: 75-88
Water Clarity: Good
Winds: 10-15+ mph
Bait: live shrimp and live caught bait fish
No large fish were harmed on this trip

My mom made the trip from Virginia to visit in September to see some cheerleading and do some fishing in Galveston instead of making the usual Thanksgiving visit.

 

We made the drive from Austin to Galveston and spent two fun days on the water.  The fishing was good.  It was windy so some of our options were limited but we still found some calmer waters with good water clarity.  On day one, my mom had fun catching two 3-4 foot blacktip sharks and a 14 pound 32 inch redfish at the North Jetty.  We tried one of my favorite locations on the channel side of the jetty but it was a little too rough, so we fished the calmer side of the jetty out near the end.

 

On day two, my mom caught several croakers and sand trout fishing with light spinning gear close to the rocks.  She also caught a nice 28 inch red on the light gear which was good fun to watch as she did the dance around the boat. We also caught a bunch of mangrove snapper in the ship channel near some structure.  They were fun on light tackle and we could have filled a cooler, but we decided to see if we could find something bigger.  

Before calling it a day, we decided to try the Pelican Island bridge and I'm glad we did.  We still had a few huge live shrimp left, so I put the largest two in the live well on a couple of my smaller bait casting reels.  After only a few minutes, one of the rods at the back of the boat had some serious bending action going on and Mom was on it like a pro.  I could tell this was going to be a big fish.  The fish circled the boat at least 3-4 times and pulled out about 50 yards of line a few times during the 20-25 minute fight.  I pitched in a couple of times to help wear out whatever we had and we were both hoping we would get to see what was putting up such a fight.  Finally, we saw a yellow tale swirl just under the water near the boat and I confirmed we had a Crevalle Jack also known as a Jackfish.  This big fish pulled the boga scale down to 30 pounds, but anyone that has ever caught one of these will know the scale doesn't do justice to such a great fighting fish.  Great way to end the day and the trip.

 

 

September 1-3, 2012

My daughter and I made a trip to Port O'Connor for the long weekend.  The trip down was an adventure and took longer than normal, so we decided to stay an extra night and fish on Sunday and Monday morning too.  On the trip down to POC, we had a blown tire on the trailer and made it to a Walmart using our spare tire, but decided not to chance not having a spare so it took a little while to get another tire and mount the spare back on the trailer.  Oh well, just part of the adventure.  

I usually fish the waters in Galveston and have only been to POC two other times with limited success on both trips.  Well, this trip was like the other two - limited fishing success.  The winds were stiff each day which reduced some of the fishing options especially since I don't know the bays around POC at all and didn't want to lose a lower unit in some shallow spot.  We primarily fished the big jetties and mostly the back side in the bay near Bird Island.  We saw a few bull reds landed but none for us.  We caught sharks, whiting, a few small gafftops and of course, the elusive hardhead catfish (moved to get away from them).  We did have a few UFOs that peeled line and either slipped the hook or broke the line.  One of the unidentified fish was in the intercoastal waterway in a large barge slip in about 20 feet of water and was likely a black drum or sheepshead based on the surrounding structure.  The fish hit my daughter's line hard and went for a fast run into some pilings and the short steel leader was not enough to keep the fish from cutting the line.

Even though the fishing was slow, we still had a great time being out on the water.  I do not take for granted that my time fishing with my daughter could be limited, so any time we spend on the water is always a bonus.  I hope she fishes with me until I'm 90, but you never know.

A few of the sharks (sharpnose and bonnetheads) were very active and some of the largest we have ever caught, so I released them on the side of the boat.  We did catch one shark small enough for a photo op.

We netted one struggling bull red (about 20 pounds) that had been caught in about 30 feet of water by someone that failed to "vent" the fish.  The distended air bladder prevented the fish from going back down, so it was floating on its side.  We vented the fish and it revived rather quickily and swam away hopefully to live another day and help make lots of little redfish.