April 29- May 7, 2008 - I have been is Mississippi for the past few days, so I`am just catching up on some of our recent trips. I had the Diller party out on Friday. Once again very windy. A few trout and 9 reds for our effort.  Capt. Barry had the Minkoff family, a limit of reds on Saturday, rough weather and all. Sunday they tried the trout with not much luck, so it was back on the reds only catching 5 or 6.  Sunday Capt. Tommy had the Cook party 30 plus trout with only 9 keepers and 1 drum. Monday Capt. Barry had Jeff Comer and Terry King. A bag of trout brought home for dinner.  Tuesday Capt Mike had Bill and Rob from New York. No fish were kept but several nice reds were caught and released. Hopefully the wind will give us a break and allow us to fish our trout areas. See you on the water, Capt. E.J.

April 21-28, 2008 - Great Fishing and Great Weather was the theme this week.

This week the fishing continued to be real strong for us. With most boats targeting trout early in the week, and redfish the last couple of days. Trout have been caught early in the morning, and usually fast. Guides and customers leave the dock at safe light, and usually after a 25 minute ride, the anglers are slinging trout over the side an onto ice. We have been fishing around Barataria Bay, as well as to the north east side of the Barataria Bay. Been seeing loads of shrimp popping all over the surface, and nice groups of birds working the school trout. We have been fishing with glow beetles under a popping cork, and the trout have been hammering them. Low tide this week has been in the early morning hours, so we have been fishing an incoming tide most of the week. Towards the latter part of the week, the redfish bite had taken off. With schools of baby mullet cruising up and down the banks of area bays, the redfish are finally out of the ponds and gorging themselves on the mullets. We have been fishing the areas around Lake Salvador, Rigolets, and the shores of Turtle Bay and Little Lake. Capt. Kevin got on an insane redfish bite on Saturday morning, and the fish would only take the purple and chartreuse cocahoe with a spinner. He said he tried the Baby one minus, the new Berkley Mullet and gulp shrimp, gold spoons, and the fish were reluctant to hit anything but the spinner bait. The redfish have been quality fish as well, with most fish going between 25-30 inches.

On Thursday I had Chuck Sharamataro and his son Kyle back for their yearly Jazz Fest trip. 15 trout and 10 plus reds for their effort. All fish caught tight lining. On Saturday Capt. Tommy, Barry and myself had the Mike Witte bachelor party. We had set 8:30 as a departure time, too many Coors, a flat tire, getting lost and the guys showed at 11:30. With only a couple hours to fish we put a few trout and 1 keeper drum in the boat, enough to send them to Jan's for lunch. Everything caught on beetles under a cork.

Got some boats open this week with some nice weather, if you want to take advantage of our all inclusive trips, please call. You will not be disappointed.

 

April 17-20, 2008 - Excellent Fishing Over the weekend.

Sunday, three boats out. Capt Joe had the Murdoff party, Capt. Barry and I had the Cuevas party from Mississippi. Finally a day without wind. The shrimp are moving in and the trout are right behind them. Over 200 trout and 9 reds landed between the three boats. One of Capt. Barry's guest boated a 30# plus bull red, Beetles under a cork for the trout and spinner baits for the reds.

After very rough conditions Friday, Saturday turned out to be a much better day for the Hahn's. Left Victoria Inn's dock at 7am sharp. It didn't take long to put the first red in the boat but for the next few hours it was a challenge. Around 11 am the fish seemed to turn on and they managed to land several keepers and a half dozen throw backs. We didn't try for trout, but picked up a few along the way. They only kept one 16" trout and one 17" red for dinner at Victoria Inn's restaurant. Spinner baits on power pro line is all we used.

 

 

April 15-16, 2008 - Jim Palmer had booked this trip back in January. It turned out to be January weather in the middle of April. Jim and James Palmer, Tom Harris and Tom Brock, a party of Georgia and Alabama boys fished both sides of the Barataria waterway.  We probably covered 100 miles, thousands of cast, thru everything we had on the boat and the fish still won. A nice group of guys, hard fisherman and enough fish to fill the board. Hopefully with the south wind we will have some water for the weekend.

April 8 -14, 2008 - As the Wind Blows!

Will this wind down south ever quit blowing? For the past 2 months, myself and our guides, and the rest of Louisiana anglers have been dealing with blustery winds, dirty water, drastic temp. changes. One day the wind blow 20+ out the south, which brings all the water in, and then the next day, it will blow 20+ out of the north pushing all of the water out. The area lakes and bays are like a turbulent washing machine that doesn't know what to do with itself. With all that being said, we are still catching fish. As hard to believe as that might sound, fishing in Lafitte offers anglers spots to fish when the weather does not cooperate. On the high wind, high water days, we can get deep into the marsh, and toss spinner baits and gold spoons in front of redfish, and they are eager to bite and hungry. On windy, low water days, we have canals that run deep in the marsh that will have 4-7 feet of water in them, and all the fish come out of the ponds and feed in the canals. Usually some market shrimp on the bottom or under a cork will catch them every time. I myself would love to get out and start hammering the trout. I know they are out there, we just can't get near them. Once the wind decides to blow itself out, it should be easy picking from Lafitte to Grand Isle out in Barataria Bay, Hackberry, and Grand Bayou. Until then, redfish is the ticket, and believe me, we are more than happy to get after them, day after day.

On Friday I had the Willard family, in town for a bachelor party. They kept only enough fish for lunch at Jan's. Sunday Capt. Barry had the Dreher party. The water had dropped almost a foot from the north winds but they fished hard to put some reds in the boat. Spinner baits and shrimp under a cork was the only baits used. Out the next several days, will post reports thru the week. Check out the Bald Eagle below. We have been seeing regularly.

 

April 2-7, 2008 - Fishing down in Lafitte is currently good, and getting better every day. We are starting to work our way slowly towards our summer patterns. Soon the shrimp we be popping all over the place, and the speckled trout will start going crazy. Redfish has been good. With higher, and cleaner water in the ponds to the SW and SE sides of the bayou. We haven't been catching any huge fish, but many in the 5-7 pound range. Saturday I had Gary and Debbie from Texas. Sunday, I had Allison, John and Dennis, a local group, and finally on Monday, I had Scott and  Thomas from New York, who fished with a buddy Frank from Mississippi. Fished the marsh all three days for redfish and  had a few trout each day. All fish caught on spinners with H&H cocahoes, Blk/chart, smoke/chart and purple/chart. The trout bite has just been too unpredictable for us the last couple weeks, with the windy weather, and dirty water, so its been mostly redfish and a few great bass trips. But the trout bite should get consistent in the near future, with the warming weather, and an influx of shrimp, end of the month should be great.

 

April Fool's Day, 2008 - Mr. Larry Stephenson is an artist. He had been at an art show in Houston and was traveling to Atlanta for another art show there. He usually does several shows a year and always makes it his business to do a little fishing on the way. We left the dock at 6:30am. Weather was nice with light winds at the time of our departure with some increase shortly there after. Easy redfish limit for him,  as he ended up catching  dozen or so, 1 nice trout, 1 nice flounder, {which will be dinner} and 2 catfish. Most fish caught on spinner baits, H&H Cocahoes, Purple/char and smoke/char, with gold spinners. Thanks for fishing with us Larry!

 

March 31, 2008 - This evening, Ed, Brent and Wayne were in town for a conference and could only do a short afternoon trip. Asked them to meet me at the dock at 1245pm, and we left the dock at 1pmand headed out for a very brief 4 hour trip. With limited time, strong winds, and high tide, I knew where I need to go. Off to the ponds. We made our way through the winding marsh, then I ducked off on a canal that usually holds some deeper water. About 500 yards down the canal they had a cut dumping gorgeous pond water into the canal. Pulled up, set anchor, and out the baits went. Within seconds, the first cork dunked, and it was fish on. Nice 5 pound red. For the next 3 hours we were on a nice bite of easy, relaxing fishing. Ended the short trip with 18 reds, 3 sheepshead, 3 drum and 1 catfish. Not a bad trip fishing that time span, plus 20mph winds. All fish caught on shrimp under a cork at anchor. Out again tomorrow.

 

To read more reports from other months, please view our Archived Reports page.