The Great Louisiana Adventure

I live by Lake Lanier here in Georgia and I love to fish it. But a man can only spend so much time fishing in 50’ of water with the jet skis flying around him all the time. This is why every year Bill Greene and I go down south of New Orleans to Happy Jack, Louisiana to fish for redfish. Most of our fish are caught in less than two feet of water where you can actually see the fish strike your bait. We’ve spent entire days on the water without seeing another boat. We use standard bass fishing tackle and lures, but it is a different kind of experience. We intend to invite club members to join us in the future. You never know…if my name gets drawn we may be holding a tournament in the Louisiana Delta next year.

These are pictures from our latest trip in February.

Believe it or not, this is the size redfish we like to catch. This size tastes the best!

Another nice one.

This is another critter we chase. A speckled trout, or spotted sea trout for you Yankees. This happens to be the biggest speck I’ve ever caught. The fish hit a topwater lure. Typically, they’ll shake those topwater plugs off at the boat right before you net them just to tease you. But we got this one in the boat. Yes, in this picture I’m about to pee my pants I’m so excited.

I’m all for catch and release. But sometimes catch and fillet can be very rewarding….

Let’s just say that this turned out to be a good day. This is a 10lber caught on 10lb line. We release all the big ones like this. Once they get to be about 6 lbs their taste goes downhill. We released many 6-plus lbers on this trip.

And I wouldn’t be a good fishing partner if I didn’t remind Bill what a good day I had.J

Another nice speck.

This fish was caught on a 3/8 oz terminator spinnerbait. I watched him inhale it. It is so cool catching fish like this on regular bass tackle.

Another cool aspect of fishing down there…variety. Here you have it: specks, reds, and bass in the same day. For some reason we didn’t catch any flounder on this day though.

Bill catches another nice red.

Notice the head net. The gnats will absolutely eat your ass up in the marsh if the wind is calm. You can cover yourself in Off and the gnats will swim in it. After you put on Off you will feel bites on your arms and look down to see little gnats doing the backstroke in it shooting the little gnat bird up at you. I hate those little buggers. The insect net seems to be the best defense.

Here is the P-Line testament. This fish was caught on 8lb P-Line. This fish weighed about 11 lbs. An 11lb redfish pulls like a freight train, so that says a lot for P-Line. The line did break off on the next fish I hooked, but that is my fault for not retrying.

My Dad fished with us one day.

These are typically the size reds and specks that we eat. Unfortunately, we discovered an excellent restaurant in Empire, LA and getting motivated enough to cook these guys becomes tough towards the end of the trip.