Mwatson and I decided on a whim with the low-wind weather window we had Monday night to take the yaks out and do some night fishing. We had a protected shoreline on Galveston's west bay and mainly fished surface lights. I don't know if the super windy weekend had it so that trout could not eat, but that night was an extended prairie fire - they fed voraciously from the time we got out on the water at 10:30 pm until about 2 am when the minor ended. I easily boated 70 trout and for the first time in ages, the keeper-to-dink ratio had the keepers winning at a 4:1 keepers ratio. We did not keep any fish, but we could easily have scored double, "old" limits. And I am not talking about pencils either - my 10 fish stringer would have been 3 - 18s and the rest would have been 19-23. Almost every trout I caught was girthy and super fat, having been foraging on the abundant bait always present in April waters, and they were firm and fought hard. They were like causeway trout, or what some may call tide runners (the existence of which people debate, apparently, according to the Bite Me Podcast). Most fish came during a 1-2 am minor when it got to be every cast for a while for a full hour. Temps were 71 all night and very few mosquitos - I think I had one ear buzz all night. The moon was a half moon so the tides were not crazy, but they were slow outgoing all night and seemingly was just enough to kick the fish into strong feed mode.
Most of my trout came on a Clear/Bone/glitter 4-inch Down South on a 1/8 oz jighead. I threw topwaters into feeding fish, but not one blew up on it, so matching
close to the hatch was the way to go. Since they seemed so hungry, I guess the bait just needed to be close to the 2-inch shad and 1-inch glass minnows in the lights. I got so tired of catching toward the end that I decided to tie on TSL Grasswalker rigged weedless. I love that lure for certain presentations/conditions but my hook-up ratio with it sucks (I usually miss 4 bites for every one I catch), so I thought I'd tie it on and practice for an upcoming trip to Port Mansfield. I wanted to get better at feeling the bite and setting the hook, and there's no better time to do that when you know you are in a pod of feeding fish.
Surprisingly, I did not hook or even see one red in the bunch. Come to think of it, I never hooked a sand trout either, which was odd.
Sorry, but I did not take any pix. Watson may have.
I know it is an artificial comparison, but if one used just that night as a sample size, then West Galveston Bay has fully recovered from the freeze. That conclusion would, of course, be misleading given the small sample size. Anecdotally, I went out on my boat for day trips twice in April, and zeroed out one day and caught a bunch of gafftops, a pin fish and a hardhead on the other, so I would say we still have more work to do.
In that regard, I like the 3 fish limit. We hardly keep fish anymore anyway, and I would love to see the fishery return to what it was like in the 2000's when I started saltwater fishing hard. Many old salts talk so fondly of what it was like in the 70's and 80's, so if you are one of those folks, I now know what you mean!
