6-29/30-19 SLP night fishing with my dad, and bonus swimming excursion

Post Reply
User avatar
Chubs
Posts: 680
Joined: Wed Oct 25, 2017 10:54 am

6-29/30-19 SLP night fishing with my dad, and bonus swimming excursion

Post by Chubs »

Hey everyone. Long time no post. Been very busy trying to relocate to Katy and I finally made it back to the kayak while my wife and kids are out of town for the week. Here's my report from the weekend

Area fished: San Luis Pass houses, all 3 canals and perimeter houses
Time fished: Launch around 8:00 PM, off water around 3:00 AM
Bait seen: Tons of little pogys, shrimp, and crabs, about 1" in length avg. was a sight to behold.
Fish: Caught 12 keeper specs, largest 22". 1 large sand trout
Method: Fished canal lights, steady fishing but had to stick and move.
Lures/ Baits: Clear with gold glitter DOA shrimp was the ticket. Caught the largest spec on 10# braided line with 12# flouro leader and DOA shrimp. According to the Bite Me podcast, clear glitter baits work wonders when the live bait you are competing with is small. This seemed to prove that theory but I think the fish were eating anything you threw at them as long as it was the size of a DOA shrimp lol.
Notes: Other boats in the area and also people working their own docks, avoided others and gave them room. Had an unfortunate accident (see description below)

Moon phase/ Solunar Coefficient/ during time fished:
Add description
Add description
1.png (36.63 KiB) Viewed 2293 times
Solunar synopsis:
The fish were more active during the solunar timeframe, though my largest specs (22" and ~20") were caught around 9:30PM. The fish were also still very active till about 1:45 AM. Felt we could have stuck around and grinded out a limit after the solunar ended, but we were ready to get off the water.

Weather/ Oceanography:
Add description
Add description
My dad and I ended up going fishing on Saturday night and were going to keep an eye on the weather. There had been a real bad storm earlier in the day, we were fishing the Quintana jetty (nothing too exciting to report from there) at the time it started to roll in so got off the water and decided to regroup at night.
We launched the kayaks and started paddling to the night spot. Just about as we were getting out of the launch site, a huge windstorm hit us (20 mph sustained winds with 25 mph gusts per tide station). Almost called it off right then, but I knew where we were going was protected from the winds so we pushed on. Riskiest part was when we were in the actual pass heading to the canals. Never felt like we were going to tip, but we were going with the wind. Had we been against the wind it would be a different story and we would have just gone to the dock and waited it out.
Someone from a dock offered to let us anchor up and get out of the water but we felt we were ok. Was a little hairy still but we both had out life jackets on (don't leave shore without them!!) and made it to the canal.
Fished our way to the back of the lights and I ended up picking up the largest 2 specs of the night, a 22" and another around 20" at the very back lights. While there I was working a green light and a car pulled up and the green light went out. The guy got out of his car and asked if we messed up his light or snagged it. We did not do anything of the sort so I told him no sir, and politely got away as quick as I could since I could tell he didn't trust us.
We worked the area some more on the way out then went to go to the next canal over. Looked down the canal and saw a lot of people and boats in the canal so we decided to press on to the last.
Got to the end house and this is where the fun started. I was standing up and fishing in the pass at the end house, there was a slight chop to the water though. I started feeling a bit tippy so I sat down in my elevated chair. As soon as I hit the chair though, the CHAIR SLID!!! My center of gravity was overboard and I fell in the water, and unfortunately the boat tipped over with me thanks to me sitting on the chair and being connected.
I had a rod in my hand when I fell over, and saw some of the floating gear getting out from under the boat so I grabbed it. I tried to flip the boat but couldn't do it with the gear in my hands. Luckily dad was there so I called him over and handed him the stuff in my hands. I then got the boat flipped and got myself back into the boat. Then I examined the damage...
I lost a good amount of crap in the water at the bottom of the pass including 2 of my good casting rod and reels :( :( :( that was probably a $350 loss in gear to replace like new… sigh…
I was real worried I lost my keys and wallet but thankfully they stayed under the seat in my tray I keep things in.
The phone was in my pocket since I don't normally care if it gets wet since it's a galaxy active and supposed to be waterproof.
Dad asked what I wanted to do now... I said might as well keep fishing!!! :P
We ended up catching 11 more keeper fish and a few throw backs. Was a good night other than the dunking. The house at the end of the canals always has a bright overhead light on. This is right where I was dunked. Right as we had begun re-fishing one of the guys that was at the house told us we were welcome to fish the lgihts but we should go over to the shadows otherwise the specs would see us (nobody was fishing the dock). We were on the other side from where he was pointing and just as he was telling me this I hook up a huge spec. So I'm focused on that and said something to the guy like "Yea ok" not trying to be rude but not really concentrating on talk. The spec busted loose as I was reeling in then I told the guy "thanks for the advice" but he must have taken the wrong way or thought I was being an ass or something cause he left without a word then turned off the lights. Lol.
I tried to take a few pictures but the phone was dead, so I'd turn it back on thinking it was out of battery. It gave me a warning that it had shut down due to overheating???
Got it on but it was acting very unresponsive. put it back in my pocket and kept going.
We kept at it till about 2:30 then were just tired and ready to get off the water. So once we got off the water (around 2:30), I found out my phone was off again and booted it up again, it again told me it shut down due to overheating!!  It stayed on for about 2-3 minutes then threw up an error message saying it was overheating again. Uh oh...
Tried to turn it back on but no dice.
Crap!
Got back to the camper and it still wouldn't turn on. Went to bed and tried again in the morning. It turned on for a few minutes and shutdown due to overheating again. Here we are Tuesday now and I think I have a nice new brick… there is a nice new $500 new phone charge too. yippee!

That was an expensive trip ~$850… Might as well have just bought our 12 specs at pappadeux's.

Was it worth it? … Hell ya!!! (don't tell my wife)

Here is the meat haul pic, would have liked to get other pictures but the phone is shot:
Add description
Add description
Specles.jpg (46.31 KiB) Viewed 2293 times
User avatar
Ron Mc
TKF 5000 Club
TKF 5000 Club
Posts: 5675
Joined: Fri Jan 20, 2006 6:12 pm
Location: downtown Bulverde, Texas
Contact:

Re: 6-29/30-19 SLP night fishing with my dad, and bonus swimming excursion

Post by Ron Mc »

well that's cleaning up - great report, terrible loss, good follow up
User avatar
Chubs
Posts: 680
Joined: Wed Oct 25, 2017 10:54 am

Re: 6-29/30-19 SLP night fishing with my dad, and bonus swimming excursion

Post by Chubs »

I should add a public service announcement. I found out when I tightened the straps for my chair, I normally do it when they are dry. I knew at one point but had forgotten that when ropes and such get wet they slacken up. Our paddle through the wind storm took on a lot of water and thoroughly wetted the straps which I'm certain caused them to go slack. When I got back on my yak I found those straps were of course loose and the chair was able to slide left and right. I tightened it down then and there and had no further problems all night.

Had I thought about this before I launched, I would have pre-wetted the straps and then tightened everything down. I remember an inflatable kayak rental outfit doing this for me many years back when I kayaked at Big Bend. Unfortunately that was a costly lesson to forget.

Also! I thought later how I had my anchor and rope clipped to my anchor trolley ring. the rope was secure and nothing happened, but what if that rope had wrapped around my foot or worse as I went overboard? I used to always carry a knife on my life jacket but the ones I bought would either always come disconnected or worse pop out of their sheath. Obviously coming out of the sheath on an inflatable would be bad for business so I stopped bringing them. I might want to rethink that approach but I need something that is going to stay in it's sheath until I need it! Any suggestions?
imaoldmanyoungsalt
Posts: 477
Joined: Mon Dec 25, 2017 11:21 am

Re: 6-29/30-19 SLP night fishing with my dad, and bonus swimming excursion

Post by imaoldmanyoungsalt »

Great report and glad to hear from ya Chubs. I've been wondering what happened to you. That was no doubt a productive but expensive trip. Now I know my galaxy fons not waterproof. Thanks for being the "fall guy" on that one, pun intended. Sounds like some really good time spent with your dad though. And hey, look at this way, you could've spent that money on a guided trip for 2 to catch those fish so.... it's a wash?(these puns are just to easy)

Seriously tho, good job on the catching and as for the rest, glad it was just material loss and nothing more.

Sent from my SM-G892A using Tapatalk
User avatar
Chubs
Posts: 680
Joined: Wed Oct 25, 2017 10:54 am

Re: 6-29/30-19 SLP night fishing with my dad, and bonus swimming excursion

Post by Chubs »

heh, well that's one way to look at it, that paid for a guided trip heh.

The phone has been dunked multiple times in the past with no problems, including me wading into the surf and fishing for 30 minutes before I realized I left it in my pant pocket.

I thought it was indestructible but it's also pretty old now (an S6), and has been dropped multiple times (I'm a bit of a butter fingers) and stepped on over concrete before I realize what happened. It's probably just been abused too much and finally a seal must have gave. That is my guess anyway.

Funny story (ok not that funny) I watched a youtube video that said you can bang the power button sometimes to fix the phone. So I was banging to power button on my granite countertop with no results. Then I thought I could bang it on the home screen button since that was acting sluggish when I got it to work last time. Can you guess what happened next? Some might have missed the button with one of the whacks and accidentally cracked his screen in the process... :clap: :clap: :clap:
Post Reply