Sabine Lake fly and conventional tackle fishing reports & photos
Saturday, September 22, 2007
Speckled Trout OnThe Move
9/22/2007 I am on call this weekend but managed to fish the North end of the lake with out getting paged today until after noon. The top water bite was there but slow. She pups in chrome sides/ blue back, Bone/silver sides and a spook jr. pink nose /white body all got bit. I lost a trout that felt to be in the 4 lb. class on the bone pup. After the sun got up we moved to plastic on lead. Bone /diamond, glow/chrt., morning glory shad tails caught fish. Morning glory seemed to get bit more. Fish were in 3 to 6 foot of water. The West wind had the lake to ruff to fish for me so we fished the Leeward sides of the islands. We had 6 Trout that would keep by noon, 4 throw backs and lost 2 more really solid fish. The beautiful sunrise this morning combined with the cooler temps. and trout that we got made for another good day on the water. I did keep the fish this time. My wife makes a great "Trout Almondine" . Sounds like supper I hope, Tight lines, Mike http://rectorsguideservice.com/
Saturday, September 15, 2007
9/15/2007
Humberto didn't hurt flats fishing!
Rob Lord had scheduled a flats trip with me this past Tuesday to fish on Saturday. A few days later we were looking at hurricane force winds.We weren't quite sure if we were going to fish by Thursday evening but I told Rob to wait and see what Friday brings. There wasn't that much rain associated with the storm and by Friday evening the tide had fallen to normal levels. I drove out to the marsh West of Bridge City and the water looked great so we decided to fish the next day. Now my concern is the wind forecast that went from Northerly @ 7 mph to Northerly@ 10 to 15 mph. I am so glad we didn't cancel the trip. We boated 8 or 9 Reds and had 1 Flounder to the boat that might have kept this morning. We missed another 4 or so Reds during the trip. All were rat Reds from 12 to 19 inches except for one 26 inch 6 lb. beauty Rob caught early on in the trip. The wind was light in the morning with a beautiful sun rise but kept building after 10:00am. The Reds didn't seem to care as we caught fish from right after day light up until around 11:00am. We called it quits around noon as the bite had slowed way down. We may have caught another bite around 2:00pm when the tide should have really started falling but we didn't. The fish hit Zoom horny toads in the morning but after the sun got up we switched to a Strike king spinner bait the rest of the trip. Rob had brought his mother Patsy along so she could enjoy the scenery and maybe catch a fish or two. The Red she caught had several beautiful spots on it's body.I had to work until midnight Friday and was worried about being tired, it's funny how a good bite can rejuvenate the soul. I really had a good day with Patsy and Rob and was glad to see the marsh survived the Hurricane. Tight lines, Mike
Hurricane Humberto pictures
Finally got a chance to post the few pictures I took of the damage. WE were fortunate and had power restored on our street by 7:00pm the same day Humberto blew in. Mostly downed tree limbs and power line poles. All of the chemical plants on chemical row in Orange TX. lost power. The safety functions kicked in and all the gasses went to the flairs lighting up the night Sky's. They were still burning a day later at some sights. We have been on 24 hour coverage at the plant where I work so that's why I just got to post. Mike
Thursday, September 13, 2007
WOW, What A BLOW!
Woke up this morning at 4:00am to hurricane force winds. The rain wasn't very heavy though there was some very full ditches in places. The wind had the tide up and wasn't letting the ditches drain. By this evening the water level had dropped in the bayou about 10 inches. I am posting from work and can't download the few pictures of the damage around Bridge City I took. The damage isn't even close to what Rita caused but we don't have electricity. Word is it could be 24 to 36 hours to get Bridge City back up and running. I guess the worst damage is the downed power lines, 2nd is the few tree limbs that broke off. I did hear of one death in Bridge City. I was told a car port blew over and smashed an unfortunate soul. Hopefully the system blew through so fast the marsh fishing should still be possible by the weekend. The big factor is if the water levels drop quickly.I pray we don't get a fish kill with all the leaves that were blown into the waterways like with Rita. Maybe I can post some pictures on Friday, I'm stuck at work until midnight on stand by for now.
tight lines, Mike http://rectorsguideservice.com ¶ 5:21 PM 0 comments
Woke up this morning at 4:00am to hurricane force winds. The rain wasn't very heavy though there was some very full ditches in places. The wind had the tide up and wasn't letting the ditches drain. By this evening the water level had dropped in the bayou about 10 inches. I am posting from work and can't download the few pictures of the damage around Bridge City I took. The damage isn't even close to what Rita caused but we don't have electricity. Word is it could be 24 to 36 hours to get Bridge City back up and running. I guess the worst damage is the downed power lines, 2nd is the few tree limbs that broke off. I did hear of one death in Bridge City. I was told a car port blew over and smashed an unfortunate soul. Hopefully the system blew through so fast the marsh fishing should still be possible by the weekend. The big factor is if the water levels drop quickly.I pray we don't get a fish kill with all the leaves that were blown into the waterways like with Rita. Maybe I can post some pictures on Friday, I'm stuck at work until midnight on stand by for now.
tight lines, Mike http://rectorsguideservice.com ¶ 5:21 PM 0 comments
Saturday, September 08, 2007
Curse of the fly rod
I had high hopes of fishing the lake today with my fly rods. The past few days had calm mornings then the wind and thunder storms build after noon. I loaded up 4 fly rods along with my conventional tackle and headed for the lake early this morning. As I broke out in the lake through East pass I could see the white caps glinting in the early morning light. I was in hopes the morning wind would lay but it only got stronger so I never got the fly rods out all day. The tide wasn't going to fall until after 2:00pm. but hey you have to fish when you can fish. I did manage 7 Red fish on the spinning rod today, only thing they didn't quite make the 20" mark.
I don't think I would have caught 3 of the fish if it wasn't for the CastAway HG40 Titanium rod and the PowerPro braided line I was using. The sensitivity of this set up is unreal. I think if a fish breathes on the bait you can feel it through the rod. Some times the bite is so suttle you need all the help you can get. I only had one Trout bite early this morning on a She pup but after 3 blow ups it lost interest. I threw a soft plastic back in but it was ignored to. A big thunder storm swept right down the lake today but I managed to run around the North side of it and only got sprinkled on. The water had calmed down on the back side of the storm and I found rafts of shad working the North end of the lake. I only caught one Red a Gafftop and a black drum from under them on a Hoganar. I tried soft plastic with out a strike? Looks like the best bite was on the Louisiana shore line for me There are more storms building and the tide hasn't gained momentum to stimulate a good bite so I called it a day.
I guess that's why they call it fishing, Tight lines, Mike
http://rectorsguideservice.com ¶ 3:56 PM 0 comments
I had high hopes of fishing the lake today with my fly rods. The past few days had calm mornings then the wind and thunder storms build after noon. I loaded up 4 fly rods along with my conventional tackle and headed for the lake early this morning. As I broke out in the lake through East pass I could see the white caps glinting in the early morning light. I was in hopes the morning wind would lay but it only got stronger so I never got the fly rods out all day. The tide wasn't going to fall until after 2:00pm. but hey you have to fish when you can fish. I did manage 7 Red fish on the spinning rod today, only thing they didn't quite make the 20" mark.
I don't think I would have caught 3 of the fish if it wasn't for the CastAway HG40 Titanium rod and the PowerPro braided line I was using. The sensitivity of this set up is unreal. I think if a fish breathes on the bait you can feel it through the rod. Some times the bite is so suttle you need all the help you can get. I only had one Trout bite early this morning on a She pup but after 3 blow ups it lost interest. I threw a soft plastic back in but it was ignored to. A big thunder storm swept right down the lake today but I managed to run around the North side of it and only got sprinkled on. The water had calmed down on the back side of the storm and I found rafts of shad working the North end of the lake. I only caught one Red a Gafftop and a black drum from under them on a Hoganar. I tried soft plastic with out a strike? Looks like the best bite was on the Louisiana shore line for me There are more storms building and the tide hasn't gained momentum to stimulate a good bite so I called it a day.
I guess that's why they call it fishing, Tight lines, Mike
http://rectorsguideservice.com ¶ 3:56 PM 0 comments
Monday, September 03, 2007
More Sun and a later tide today
I had the pleasure of fishing with Mr. John Landrum today. John and I hit the flats about 6:45am. this morning. The fog that we had yesterday was gone and the conditions were much brighter and earlier than yesterday. I think this had some thing to do with the lack of fish feeding early on in the morning. John kept on blind casting a Gold spoon fly until he finally hooked up, with a nicely colored Rat Red that put up a good tug on his Orvis 8 wt . fly rod. As we worked along the grass lines for about another 20 min. John was again rewarded for his persistence with another beautiful Red fish. Finally around 11:30am the tide started falling and soon after we spotted a 26 inch class Red fish tailing in the shallows and stalked it waiting for a good shot at it. John made a good effort to get the fly in front of the fish but it realized some thing was up and vanished right from under our noses in less than a foot of water? I think those Red fish have some kind of cloaking device that makes them invisible. The thunder storms are building right on schedule so we worked our way off the flats and still got rained on before we reached the boat ramp.It was a beautiful day on the water for the most part and the fish we caught made it even better. Tight lines,Mike
http://rectorsguideservice.com
¶ 1:30 PM 0 comments
Sunday, September 02, 2007
Red fish & Love bugs!My buddy Dale and I went and prefished for a booked trip on Monday. We finally had some lower water levels and a falling tide around noon. I noticed the water temperature felt a bit cooler also. The combination seems to have moved some fish back on the flats. Dale and I caught and released seven fish today and saw several more. Most were healthy rat Reds but we boated two that were 25 inches and weighed 5-1/2 lb. We saw a few more in that size range but we didn't mess with them. Hopefully they will show tomorrow. The overcast conditions didn't help with the sight casting but we still were able to sight cast at several fish. We only fished with Horny toads today. They work great fishing the thick moss and grass with out getting fouled all the time. I don't know if any one else is having problems with love bugs while fishing. The stinking things started swarming around the boat. They were all over the push pole and that caused me to smear several when I would make a stroke. That invoked even more to swarm the boat! Before long Dale and I had bugs crawling all over us. Take it from me , they taste as bad as they smell! Any way, the thunder storms built like clock work after noon so we called it a day before the rain started/ NOT! we caught the tip end of a shower not 300 yards from the boat ramp. Oh well it was a good day any how. Hopefully tomorrow will be as good or better. Tight lines, Mike http://rectorsguideservice.com/
Saturday, September 01, 2007
Preston went along with me and Dutch today and did some scouting. We checked the marsh flats on the Louisiana side of the Sabine river, in the Burton's ditch area. The weather conditions were less than optimal. A heavy over cast and some light drizzle persisted for most of the morning with a light Northerly breeze blowing. The tide was slack when we first got on the flats. There wasn't much activity but Preston spotted this beautifully colored rat Red pushing across the shallows. A well placed cast with a horny toad and a few cranks of the reel resulted in a loud strike and a hook up. Dutch wanted a closer look after we got it in the boat. We poled around for most of the morning and only spooked one other Red and lost another when it spit the hook out. We fished around different flats until noon then called it a day. The water was very clear in 90% of the water we covered today with healthy moss and eel grass concentrations on most every flat we crossed. I don't understand the absence of the Red fish? We did get to see a lot of wildlife as we moved around the marsh. We found the Terns pictured above taking a break and preening them selves on the remnants of an old duck blind as we slipped across a pond. The Red fish are a great bonus to catch but there not the only attraction when making a trip out into the area marshes.
Tight lines, Mike http://rectorsguideservice.com/
