February 07 at 3:18pm
Got ole Southfork back from Chuck Evans(he took her to MS to a friend of his-got her screaming)and had window of opportunity,wanted to make first-light launch but foggy conditions put a damper on dat and waited til about 7:15 am to launch and was checking out the ole 50 Johnson and got her roaring,slowed down just before a curve in bayou(thankfully)and apologized to couple in fine canoe as I did toss a decent,though manageable wake and told em I was on search for grass-bed reds and bass and whatever else ole Lady P wanted to toss my way.Greeted with very expected foggy conditions but not so bad that using common sense and good compass and slow speed could not handle(have not yet installed new Lowrance GPS/Depthfinder)and about the time the foggy conditions were improving,made my way to protected cove,tossed Yum Swim n Dingers,got one tiny bass to attack just about the time someone'Unkown' on my cell phone tried in vain to get me to answer.Never will understand logic of blocking ya identity,like I am gonna answer dat call!!!Gimme a break!!!Tossed Yum Swim n Dinger length of protected cove,made my way back to Lake and was greeted with awesome Bomber Spinner Bait conditions.Saw handful of small and large alligator gars,never a bad sign as they and reds inhale mullets and was tossing Bomber when I felt significant tug,initially thought it to be huge gator gar,looked down at huge bull red,all of 30 plus inches with head like 16 lb bowling ball and he made one real nice drag-screaming run(doubted seriously that I would get this beast in as I musta tightened drag on last spinner bait trip)and felt line go slack and line broke at the damn knot!!!At least I had em for all of about twenty seconds.Did see quite a few fine reds,had two airboat jockeys cruise by me,between my starboard side and the fine shorelines and they entered a nice trenasse,perhaps they work for the Prieto family,not exactly sure what an airboat was doing in Big Branch Marsh.Figured,quite correctly,that their boat would spook reds and somewhat predictably,spotted at least 5-7 fine reds not far from where they entered Marsh!!!Made my way to Causeway,nada after all of about 20 minutes,headed back to where I had seen airboat,water was no where near as pristine and made my way homeward!!!Gonna check out T-Funky this Sat and saw enough reds to excite me,problem gonna be low temps and cold front but bet after a few warming trends,sight-casting reds time!!!
Mandevillian
Mandevillian