Just got back from a week in GI. Given all the rain and single digit salinities, we wanted to be as close to the Gulf as we could get. The usual tricks from the linked articles are still working very well. My son and I hooked up with two personal bests at the same time at spot 1 in the Times-Picayune article, and we landed them both, a 39 lb 45.75" redfish (son) and a 42 lb 42" black drum (me). This is the same spot I caught my personal best redfish (32 lb 43"ish) in December. All fish caught at spots 1 and 4 last week on crawfish and (mostly) crab. We fished a lot of mullet, but it only caught catfish.
Just got back from a week in GI. Given all the rain and single digit salinities, we wanted to be as close to the Gulf as we could get. The usual tricks from the linked articles are still working very well. My son and I hooked up with two personal bests at the same time at spot 1 in the Times-Picayune article, and we landed them both, a 39 lb 45.75" redfish (son) and a 42 lb 42" black drum (me). This is the same spot I caught my personal best redfish (32 lb 43"ish) in December. All fish caught at spots 1 and 4 last week on crawfish and (mostly) crab. We fished a lot of mullet, but it only caught catfish.
“Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!" - The Messiah
Just got back from a week in GI. Given all the rain and single digit salinities, we wanted to be as close to the Gulf as we could get. The usual tricks from the linked articles are still working very well. My son and I hooked up with two personal bests at the same time at spot 1 in the Times-Picayune article, and we landed them both, a 39 lb 45.75" redfish (son) and a 42 lb 42" black drum (me). This is the same spot I caught my personal best redfish (32 lb 43"ish) in December. All fish caught at spots 1 and 4 last week on crawfish and (mostly) crab. We fished a lot of mullet, but it only caught catfish.
“Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!" - The Messiah
Seriously, The post said they were there for a week , and we don’t know the number of fish caught each day. Some of those fish look like they have been on ice a while. This is a rough forum. Quick to accuse and question
This forum is called the Charleston Fishing Forum…the one thing SC fishing boyz do is respect the bulls…take a pictue and release those horns, that is what a Southern fisherman does.
We live near Clemson, but maintain a residence in Baton Rouge, and frequently travel back and forth.
We have fished in SC, but not as successfully yet as in LA. From our experience, fishing in SC tends to be harder and the success is more seasonal.
All the fish in the pics are legal. Bag limit on bull reds is one per day in LA and possession limit is two per person.
Since the commercial harvest of redfish was banned in LA in the 1980s along with a complete ban on keeping redfish from federal waters about the same time, the redfish in Louisiana have made a very strong comeback. All the stock assessments in LA waters support the sustainability of existing regulations (bag, possession, and size limits), and there is no hint that keeping legal limits of redfish of legal size in any way harms the population.
There is also evidence in some parts of Louisiana that the large numbers of redfish (too many) many not be sustainable because of inadequate food sources to maintain their body condition.
I’ve discussed with my family the trade-offs between fishing SC and travelling to LA. We’ve had so much success in LA that it’s been hard to sell them on the idea that fishing in SC can possibly be as good. Our experience is that fishing in states with more restrictive limits often is not as good, because if they had as many fish, the limits would likely be just as high. We’ve had many occasions of catching over 10 bulls in a day in Louisiana which my children find quite exciting and quite a workout.
Also of interest to our family is that one scientific study took hundreds of hours to catch four redfish in SC waters. We repeated the study in LA waters and caught 50 bull reds in less time, allowing us to discover magnetoreception in red drum. Essentially, we discovered that the rate of catching redfish is changed when a small (but powerful) magnet is attached to the hook. A link to the published paper is here: http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1511/1511.09302.pdf
We got plenty of big reds here and small reds but very few slot fish, which to me says that what we keep affects the population. I personally feel we should have a 1 fish limit on reds and a upper slot limit on trout of 20in and a 5 fish limit. I really think the poachers who keep everything they catch hurt our waters more than anything and I have seen it on more than one occasion where someone is keeping under slot reds like they are whiteing. If there’s a school of 200 fish and that guy catches 30 this week 40 next week and 30 the week after and 40 the next month he pretty much solely whips out the population in the area I spoke to a man around Bowens Island once and this was the exact scenario he told me on what he was catching. I had to leave because it got me so mad and I told the game wardens to watch this area for a man of his description. I’ve been stopped twice by DNR in my boat right there and they cruise right by the docks full of fishers. I saw/fished the school in September and they would basically stay in a 1 mile area in this area they where all under slot and there was probably 200 fish. In the winter they don’t swim as much so this guy told me when they are there he would catch them till they didn’t bite anymore and take home the numbers I mentioned and even said that they didn’t catch them like a couple months ago and he basically decimated them from early December through January. I am nearly positive this was the same school. The following season when I fished the area the fishing was not nearly as good as prior years and I contribute it to mostly him and his friends and family figuring out the school will be by these docks and knowing it was just about there timings aligning of them on the dock and the school being close by.
Happy Easter and thank you for your post. I’m not going to tell you that fishing in S.C. is better than Louisiana. I will say it can be just as rewarding. One of the day’s that I had last year that I considered to be a great day, I caught one red. I went to the beach surf fishing and fished no less than 6 hours, to no avail. Refusing to walk away with the dreaded goose egg, I pushed on. At hour number 7 the rod took a pretty good dip and I had a fish on. After fighting for a bit the fished surfaced and it was a fat 36 inch red, which is a nice fish for me. What made the day special was not the fact that I caught 1 fish. It was the fact that I had to work long and hard to produce it, and I was grateful. That one fish meant as much to me as catching 10:smiley: If you eat steak every day, will it taste as good on day number 30 Allot of great chefs serve tiny portions of food at fancy restaurants. The logic behind this is similar. After continuously eating a large dish of the same food your palate becomes bored. I think you being in a new environment can offer you unique fresh new challenges and when you stick it out, you will appreciate what successes you have, even if they are small. I will also say that the fishing here is pretty good. Your family most certainly has the opportunity to have great day’s here, putting up plenty of large beautiful reds. Embrace the fact that you will have obstacles, just overcome them. Thank you for sharing and good luck Sir!
Happy Easter and thank you for your post. I’m not going to tell you that fishing in S.C. is better than Louisiana. I will say it can be just as rewarding. One of the day’s that I had last year that I considered to be a great day, I caught one red. I went to the beach surf fishing and fished no less than 6 hours, to no avail. Refusing to walk away with the dreaded goose egg, I pushed on. At hour number 7 the rod took a pretty good dip and I had a fish on. After fighting for a bit the fished surfaced and it was a fat 36 inch red, which is a nice fish for me. What made the day special was not the fact that I caught 1 fish. It was the fact that I had to work long and hard to produce it, and I was grateful. That one fish meant as much to me as catching 10:smiley: If you eat steak every day, will it taste as good on day number 30 Allot of great chefs serve tiny portions of food at fancy restaurants. The logic behind this is similar. After continuously eating a large dish of the same food your palate becomes bored. I think you being in a new environment can offer you unique fresh new challenges and when you stick it out, you will appreciate what successes you have, even if they are small. I will also say that the fishing here is pretty good. Your family most certainly has the opportunity to have great day’s here, putting up plenty of large beautiful reds. Embrace the fact that you will have obstacles, just overcome them. Thank you for sharing and good luck Sir!
That makes sense, but we are already spending lots of time on the more challenging freshwater locations like Lake Hartwell. So at least now, the family leans toward the more productive coastal fishing in Louisiana. There are several other benefits also. There is a big catfish (5-7 lbs) in the Gulf that keeps us busy,
I’m not sure about LA, but we went down to Pascagoula, MS three years ago, and their “slot” restrictions were similar. We chartered a trip while we were down, and we were introduced to the local method of catching bull reds (trolling setups-[:0]). What’s worse, they’d then GAFF these 36" and larger bulls and throw 'em in the box like dolphin or 'hoos! To each his own, I guess…
“I’m not a hundred percent in love with your tone right now…”
I’m not sure about LA, but we went down to Pascagoula, MS three years ago, and they’re “slot” restrictions were similar. We chartered a trip while we were down, and we were introduced to the local method of catching bull reds (trolling setups-[:0]). What’s worse, they’d then GAFF these 36" and larger bulls and throw 'em in the box like dolphin or 'hoos! To each his own, I guess…
Yeah, both TX and MS have stricter regs on keeping redfish, which is a consequence of having far fewer reds for the anglers chasing them. I attribute this to several factors:
LA simply has a lot more inshore water and can support many more redfish per licensed salt water angler. All that water is a tremendous nursery for huge populations as well as a tremendous source of the forage needed to grow all those fish quickly.
LA waters are much more fertile than the waters of MS and TX. This is known to be attributable to the nutrients delivered to the Gulf from the Mississippi River. Even though the mouth of the river is close to MS, prevailing currents move most of the river plume to the west, so LA waters benefit more than MS waters. The nutrients are largely depleted by the time the currents reach TX. I think of it as the difference between the number of cattle that can be supported by well fertilized farm land and the number that can be supported on infertile land.
Louisiana has both huge expanses of oyster reefs inshore and more artificial reefs (oil platforms mostly) than neighboring states. It is well known that both oyster reefs and artificial reefs significantly improve fisheries production.
“Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to gi
Allot of great chefs serve tiny portions of food at fancy restaurants. The logic behind this is similar. After continuously eating a large dish of the same food your palate becomes bored. I think you being in a new environment can offer you unique fresh new challenges and when you stick it out, you will appreciate what successes you have, even if they are small. I will also say that the fishing here is pretty good. Your family most certainly has the opportunity to have great day’s here, putting up plenty of large beautiful reds. Embrace the fact that you will have obstacles, just overcome them. Thank you for sharing and good luck Sir!