Colburn's Sabine Connection

Wind shut my trout down Friday and Saturday

There just isn't much I can tell you after today and yesterday.  An east-northeast wind that blew much harder than anticipated, really hurt our bite on the north end of the lake.  We even ran back in the bayous, but a tide that had just trickled out all week long was pouring out.  We salvaged Friday, fishing redfish in the river.

The good news is that the water clarity held up well and we need to unload the marshes to get the shrimp back out in the lake anyway.  Chuck said that he made a run in the marsh Thursday morning and found the trout chasing shrimp in one of the shallow ponds.  We did find some trout and redfish in one of the bayous, but did not have enough anchor to get set up right.

If you were going to make a run over here this week, I would not rule it out because of my report.  If the wind settles down a little, the bite will be right back on.  The La. shoreline should be the best place for you to start as it will be protected if the wind stays out of the east and the water over there still looks great.  The trout bite may or may not turn right back on, but there are enough flounder and redfish running the shoreline to keep you busy.

Sorry....Web site back up and running!

I appreciate all of the calls in regards to my web site being down.  I seldom look at it as I don't have to access it to post my reports and I had no idea it was down.

Jim Hampton boats another solid trout

In the meantime, the fishing has continued to improve.  We have been averaging probably 15-25 trout a day and most of them are in the 18 to 22 inch class.  Yesterday we had three four's and a big five in a limit, but did not have any six pound-plus trout for the first time in a five day stretch.

The water clarity is pretty good all over the lake and the fish we have found are chasing mullet and shad.  Very few birds are working as the water is so high in the marsh and bayous.  We have had big incoming tides and the water hasn't dropped much each night as it releases.

We had the slowest morning we have had in a while, but the fish made up for it following a little storm around noon.  Our best bite was in 3-5 feet of water on She Dogs and Assassin eels or Tidal Surge Split Tails in Texas Roach and glow-chartreuse.  We fished in a pretty good wind, but it didn't hurt the bite at all.

If you live in the Humble area, I will be speaking at a Northeast Houston CCA meeting at 7:00 p.m. tonight at the Cedar Landing on Lake Houston.  We are going to talk about October and November fishing on Sabine and some techniques that will give you an edge. Come out and visit...their meetings are fun.

I have some great pictures from the last few days, but my wife is on a trip until Sunday and she takes care of the picture part of this report.  I'll continue to post reports until she gets back as pictures don't help you catch fish anyway.  John, your picture is on the way. He caught his first seven pound trout on a bone She Dog, photographed it and released it.

We'll be on the water chasing them again tomorrrow morning!      

A darn good bite for right now!

This nice trout was running the shoreline

By the time Sunday afternoon rolled around, I was starting to feel a twinge of guilt for not posting earlier.  I apologize, but I was in a survival mode. The bite had been very tough all week long, but the lake started clearing up Thursday and the weather turned drop dead perfect.  I was so relieved to initially find fish working in a very small area that I was afraid it would not last four consecutive days.

Knowing that I was booked all weekend (I rarely fish Sundays) I decided to wait until tonight to post for fear that the isolated bite might get overcrowded.  By the time the weekend was over, however, we were catching trout on every flat we fished.  It continued to get better each day and we not only caught good numbers, but some big fish as well.

Another good trout caught on glow-chartreuse Sea Shad out of a slick

We had two fish over a four day period over seven pounds and several in the 5-6 pound range.  The high tides each morning flooded the flats all the way from Willow Bayou to Pleasure Island and the trout were hustling mullet until noon every day.  We caught fish on Assassin Sea Shads in glow-chartreuse and Texas Roach and topwaters as well.  We never caught the first trout in water over four feet deep and a number of the larger trout were in less than a foot of water.

I fished the same group from Houston two days and we alternated between only two flats both days.  Anytime we found slicks in the area the fish were there and they were eating.  When the bite would slow down, we would run back to the other flat and the fish would be doing their thing again.  There was very little traffic, but I feel certain the same pattern had to be going on all over the lake.

David with a trout for the Boga Grip

The first day we found the fish they started biting as soon as the tide started going out.  Those fish were on a flat, but they were very close to the mouth of a bayou on the Louisiana shoreline.  Rather than wait on the tide change each morning, we fished flats not affected by water running in or out of a bayou.

We had to wait out a pre-dawn rain Sunday morning, but it didn't slow down the bite.  I had a good trout hit a topwater on the second cast and we stayed busy the rest of the morning.  The Houston gang had at least one big trout each day, but Greg Sweeney made his trip with a beautiful slot red that hit an Assassin in the grass and led him around the boat several times.

I have my fingers crossed in regards to the weather.  This is a heck of a bite for right now and our birds haven't even started working on the north end of the lake yet.  They may be working in the afternoons, but I haven't had any reports of that yet.

Solid fish tough to find right now

The good news is that there is a lot of bait still piled up in the river and the mouth of most of the bayous around the lake.  The bad news is that nothing big is trying to eat it!

Monday, the lake was trying to clear up a little, Tuesday it just looked horrible, and today it was trying to clear up again.  In this case, clear is a foot or so of visibility.  Even with a stiff east wind keeping us pinned down, we have been able to catch a lot of small trout and rat reds on the tide change, but few keeper fish. We haven't been able to fish the areas where we were catching our better trout prior to the storm, but that doesn't explain why we aren't catching many keeper fish off the La. shoreline.

We haven't seen the first gull work in the past few days on the north end, even with a good outgoing tide in the afternoons.  We worked two schools of small trout that were chasing shrimp in the back end of Coffee Ground and there wasn't a gull in sight.  This is the time of year when it can turn on overnight, but I think the water is going to have to clear up just a little for that to happen.

We are forecast to get a 20 mile per hour north wind toward the end of the week.  That will make it tough to fish, but at the same time it should push a lot of water out of the marsh and could get things going our way.  Until it happens, some of us just have to keep grinding and covering water!

It isn't great, but its better than anticipated

Well, the fishing isn't all the way back, but it is already better than I anticipated.  The river and the bayous are still dirty, but there are some very decent stretches of clearer water in the lake.  The past two days the gulls worked over small trout on the north end of the lake and at least two groups found redfish schooling on the south end.

There was also a decent trout bite on live shad and finger mullet for folks drifting the middle of the lake around the barrel channel.  The rat reds never missed a beat, but the slot reds have slowed a little in the river and in the bayous.  The best bite under the birds was on LSU or morning glory tails rigged on a quarter ounce head.

Look for the bite to continue to improve as the water clears with the stronger tide changes and more north winds.   

How can a hurricane sneak up on you?

Chuck Uzzle called yesterday while we were still in the middle of swapping around generators to tell me that I was going to have to forfeit my computer rights.  Every time the fishing improves and I even mention more rain, it pours the next day.  I really out did myself this time!

The only good news was that we didn't have anything left to blow down after Rita.  We took it right on the chin and I had no idea it was even a hurricane until the front door blew open at 3:30 in the morning.  We got a lot of rain the day before, but more wind than rain with the storm. 

I was visiting with Ronnie Burton, the owner of The River Rat Marina, and he said that he had never seen the water rise so fast.  He lives above the Marina and said that in less than half an hour, the water in the bayou rose from two feet below the dock to covering the parking lot.  He added that it went down all most as fast once the storm passed.  He suffered some wind damage, but the grill still works!

The water is dropping out surprisingly fast, but it is extremely muddy.  I am not making any predictions as the birds were already working less than a week after Rita roared through.  Once again, I really appreciate all of the calls from both clients and regular readers of this report that offered help. I also hope that those of you that were in the middle of it fared well.    

It's getting good...that should jinx us!

Staying busy for a guide is really a "Catch 22" situation.  You have to stay booked to pay the bills, but It leaves very little time for looking for new patterns as most clients are not into paying a guide to watch him hunt fish.  After 36 years in the business, I have figured that much out.  At the same time, there's a number of good fishermen I would pay money to watch pattern fish and they aren't all guides!

I have had a couple of days off this week and have very much enjoyed doing just that.  It's much easier when you are adding to a pretty solid program.  Albert Bates, a very good Sabine fisherman in his own right, and I ran a lot of water on the north end this morning and we did in fact find some new fish.  We caught reds and specks on topwaters on the flats, caught a few trout under the birds, and even fed live shad to some very solid trout and redfish in the river before calling it a day around noon.

The water on the north side of the islands was flat due to a pretty good north wind at first light.  We found trout, ladyfish, and specks all chasing the same small schools of shad.  The water looked very good every where we fished.  Surprisingly enough, the only place we did not find fish was along the revetment wall.  The water was just beautiful over there, but there wasn't a lot of bait.

The rat reds are all over the river again, but there are some solid slot fish hanging out on the shallow flats in the lake.  We caught them on pearl Skitterwalks, gold She Dogs, and bone diamond Sea Shad in water from a foot to four feet deep.  If we can just keep the daily rains to a minimum, it will get crazy around here very shortly.   

North end slowly improving

I don't know how many more afternoon thunderstorms it will take to kill yet another good bite, but the trout are trying to do their thing on the north end of the lake.  The water looked a little worse than the day before, but we still found a few very nice trout on the flats bordering the intracoastal.

We made a short wade rather than do anything constructive prior to the football games and it was slow, but productive.  Dalton Leger made the venture worthwhile with a 26 inch speck that demolished a black-chartreuse Poppa Dog in less than two feet of water.  We released that fish and and two others that were over 24 inches that hit chrome She Pups.

They kept four smaller trout and a 24-inch red to grill while they watched the LSU-Va.Tech game.  If LSU stays healthy, the Cajun nation will be tailgating the night of the national championship! Dalton and his brother-in-law were going back this morning if the partying ended at a decent hour.  I just got in from church and I haven't heard from them yet.

I got a good report off the short rigs and a decent report from the ship channel last night.  The trout were still doing their thing in some very clear water at the rigs.  They limited on trout, but didn't catch a speck over five pounds.  Byron Lively and friends caught several keeper trout, nine flounder, and one limit of slot reds fishing Gulp on the bottom.  He said they worked the bank in nine feet of water just north of Lighthouse Cove.

       

Almost talked ourselves out of a very good trip!

I originally said "no" to a trip today only to immediately call back and agree to give it a try knowing that it would probably be tough.  We were eating shrimp burgers at the River Rat and watching it rain by noon with a box full of very solid fish.  If you don't go...you don't know!

We hit our first school of trout in the mid lake area right at daylight.  We slowed down when we saw a fish or two break the surface and before we could come to a full stop they were everywhere.  It was a combination of everything from gafftops to trout.  We even caught ladyfish and rat reds on She Dogs  and bone-diamond Sea Shads.  I added a Mauler above the tail and our trout ratio improved.

The next stop was just north of Green's and once again there were no birds, but there were a lot of fish feeding on the surface.  It was almost exclusively trout and small reds with an occasional ladyfish.  We drifted live mullet through them hoping for larger fish, but I think we caught most of our keepers on plastics.  On both stops, we left the areas with the fish still chasing bait on top.

When we could find no other fish schooling, we started drifting and free-lining live mullet over scattered shell and the best bite of the day was on.  I haven't fished much live bait this year, but this was easily the best I have done with it this summer. We caught trout up to 20 inches, slot reds to 24 inches, and three nice flounder before the rain sent us packing. The bite was only getting better when we ran back to the Marina.  We wound up cleaning 16 trout that were all 17 inches are better.

The water in the eastern half of the lake looks better than the other side, but even the water all the way to the north revetment wall does not look bad.  Once again, we were unable to get anything going between Blue Buck and the south revetment wall and that area had been very good to us a week or so ago.  Our biggest problem the past few days has been the absence of a good tide change.  It really hurt us in the bayous and river, but obviously hasn't slowed down the open-lake fish.

   

Bite has slowed down this week

I had very intention of cleaning all the love bugs out of the boat yesterday, but we only added more.  We made an afternoon run following the rains just to look and found nothing new.  There were a lot of small trout in the mouths of the bayous and we caught small redfish everywhere we checked.  We stopped in the river long enough to see a couple of nice slot reds caught on finger mullet.

The water clarity is finally starting to take a little bit of a hit.  I talked with two groups that fished the jetties and they had mixed results.  Darell and Connie Lott free-lined live shrimp and they had 17 trout and one redfish.  Darell said they never caught any trout under 16 inches and their largest fish was just under four pounds.  The other group caught a lot of small trout on plastic tails and only had four keepers when they called.

I will wash the boat today!