Like Capt. Chuck says, "It was stupid good!"

We were having a pretty darned good day up until 1:30 Tuesday and then it went from good to what Chuck calls "stupid good'!

Shon was on leave from the Air Force and happy just to be out of a cold Montana even though our initial boat ride was a little on the chilly side. When his buddy, Justin, booked the trip it was freezing in Montana and 70 degrees here. Catching fish was just a bonus for him.

We started out the day fishing two feet of off-colored water with a bug juice Flats Minnow and a stinky pink Assassin and quickly picked up two keeper reds and a pair of trout. After catching several more near miss keeper reds we ran south and fished the grass around Willow and the Gator Hole. It wasn't great, but we caught a couple more keeper reds, three more trout and several throw back reds.

Shon and Justin really got after the redfish!

When the wind started lying down around noon we ran back north and quickly finished out our limit of reds. We caught and released several more slot reds before making one more circle through the lake just to see if the birds were going to work. We were probably a mile south of the fishing piers on the north revetment wall when we saw our first flock. By the time we left, maybe an hour or so later, we were covered up with birds and big redfish.

We had been culling down rather than up all morning trying to keep the better eating fish so we were very much in a catch and release mode by that time. i have no idea how many big reds we went through, but we were worn out when we just quit and the birds were still working. I am sure that you could have thrown anything in front of them, but Shon and Justin caught every one of those fish on a pearl/lime Tidal Surge Mullet and a roach Big Minnow.

I did totally screw up one shot at a great trout thinking it was another red and trying to quickly horse it to the boat and get out of their way. Justin had just picked up the net when she broke the surface and shook the lure loose right at the boat. She was big!

Ninety percent of the birds, and there were a lot of them, were terns feeding on tiny shad. We found some fish under them, but any time there was a gull or two mixed in it was money in the bank. The water was looking much better on the La. bank than even a day before and the water in the middle of the lake looked really good. Every trout we cleaned was full of eggs. We just need a little help with the wind for things to really break loose.

Comments

[shon]

I had a blast.