# Rockport 1/11, and making sense of the week since the freeze



## pocjetty (Sep 12, 2014)

Today I decided to wade in at the little park near the airport. There is some really squishy mud up the shoreline from the park, and I thought I might sneak in a redfish or two in addition to the trout. The water was a good six inches deeper than yesterday, and got very clear overnight. It was much warmer, and there was only a breath of breeze, so I just wore a short sleeve t-shirt under my waders.

I caught two 16 inch trout on my first two casts. My waders started leaking. I caught a couple of undersized fish. Then the flight trainers showed up, doing touch-and-go's at the landing strip, and started buzzing low right over my head. Like really low, and REALLY loud. There were two of them, and they're dropping in on me about every 2-3 minutes. The bite slowed way, way down. I caught a couple more dinks, and then they cut completely off. Then, after I had waded down quite a way, the clouds started drizzling rain on me (in my short sleeved t-shirt). Here's a newsflash - rain in the winter is really cold. Some days you just have to admit defeat, pack it in, and go home.

Some days, maybe - but not this one. The rainclouds looked like they were passing. And if I'm right about super loud propeller-driven craft shutting down the bite, those fish didn't just cease to exist. They can't leave the water, and they have to keep eating. I figured they just moved down the shoreline far enough to get out from under the noise machines. So I drove down a bit and waded back in, leaky waders and all.

Soon after starting that second wade I caught some very average (17"-19") trout waist deep over mud bottom and filled out my limit. (Remember that when an airboat buzzes you when you're catching fish. Just move down a bit.) I didn't see any signs of redfish, and I had my five keepers, so I decided to wade out deeper, and found just ridiculous numbers of small trout over a patch of shell. Mostly 13"-14", with a few that could have kept, if you were just desperate for a fish fry. I started counting after I'd already caught quite a few, and when I hit 30, I decided I'd tortured enough dinks. I was thinking the whole time what a great day this would have been to take a kid fishing. There wasn't a whole lot of skill needed. Just throw it out there, let it sink, and wiggle the rod tip.

A little way down the shoreline, I knew, there is a bit of a "bowl" with some soft mud on the bottom. The fish weren't as thick there, but they were a little bigger than they had been out over the deep shell. The shallower water surrounding the depression didn't produce a single fish. Around 11:00 am, the wind started to blow from roughly south, like it often does ahead of a front. Within just a few minutes, there were waves developing. Within about 10 minutes there were whitecaps. And as the wind started to pick up, BAM! About a 22" fish, which was bigger than anything I'd caught all day. I wound up catching four more between 20" and about 23", and then it just cut off. The wind was ripping, I had gotten more sun than I intended to, and it was time to go home. (I'll post a picture below, just because I hate to report without a picture. But it's just five adequate fish that have dents from the frozen water bottles I put on top of them. Ugly picture.)

*Making sense of the week since the freeze:*

It has been a VERY good week of fishing since the freeze. The first two days, the water was sterile - it was just too cold. The third day after the freeze, I caught some VERY big trout off the end of some shell, where there was a fairly abrupt drop. I think the big fish, able to stand the cold better, moved in first. They were up on the shell feeding on small crustaceans, worms, and maybe small fish that were holding on the bottom, because that was the only thing available. The next couple of days I caught some good fish on that same shell drop-off, although not as big overall as that first day, in that same spot.

The next day (five days after the freeze), the baitfish showed back up in the shallows. I went back to the same drop-off, and found tons of small trout on top of the shell. The fishing had changed, and I didn't change tactics, even though I could see that there were bigger bait fish up in the shallow water, over mud bottom. Since then, most of the better fish I've found have all been in thigh to knee deep water, over mud and mud/shell.

Today I caught some decent keeper fish, and a bunch of small fish. The water was MUCH warmer than it had been, and the small fish I caught in deeper water were noticeably colder-bodied than the big fish from shallower mud bottom. I think there are some good clues in there about how the fish might behave after one of the big cold snaps of winter. The coolest thing for me was seeing just how long it took for them to move from deeper water up onto the sun-warmed mud.

One other thing worth noting: I had by far the best results this week with 3" thin-bodied paddle-tails. (Think small Cocahoe Minnow.) The larger Cocahoe type tails didn't produce as well, and fatter-bodied shad-type plastic was worse still. I've heard people recommending small baits recently, and I think it's good advice. The 3" tails pop up and sink more quickly. A lot of the fish I caught were picking the bait up right off the bottom, after a twitch and fall. It seemed like they were able to suck the smaller bait up off the bottom, and get hooked. I got some thumps on the bigger tails, but a lot less hook ups. The bigger the tail, the harder it was to suck off the bottom. Color didn't seem to make one bit of difference. Strawberry/white, white/chartreuse, dark "natural" colors with and without a lighter tail color, it didn't matter. It was all about size and action.


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## schoalbeast101 (Oct 23, 2014)

Great Report!


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## coin-operated (Mar 17, 2011)

Thanks for the thorough reports and the musings. I have learned a lot from reading your posts.


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## SaltwaterSlick (Jun 11, 2012)

Great report sir! I learn so much from you guys who take the time to do these detailed reports. It is greatly appreciated!

And one thing that has been striking to me looking at the pics of these winter fish, especially post freeze fish is how long and skinny they look! 

Thanks again!


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## Salty_UH (Feb 15, 2017)

thanks for the report....awesome read

i fished that location about 3 summers ago and found the local gator "Henry", have you heard any stories lately about him still roaming the area?

When i saw him it was to the south...so if you enter at the park and walk along south shore to the broken down pilings he was on the south side of the pilings, swimming in and out of the shoreline

great report again and man i miss Copano


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## Txredfish (Oct 27, 2010)

Great report. I always like to read your reports. Much better than a lot of the reports that just say look what I caught and no info. I have learned some things from your reports. You are right on with the small paddle tail. Last week I was using a small 3" paddle tail, purple body and chartruse tail. Caught about 30 under size trout and reds, working slow on bottom in about 2' of water over mixed shell and mud. Managed 2 keeper reds.


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## Rack Ranch (May 25, 2004)

Good report...Water dropped out over night with those strong North winds.


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## Puddle_Jumper (Jun 30, 2014)

Another great report.. Thanks again for sharing !


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## LarryG (Aug 12, 2005)

Very interesting. I experienced the same thing Monday night fishing under lights on Caney Creek. Usually several dinks for each keeper trout. Water was still cold from the freeze period a few days prior. In about 3 hours of fishing I caught 25 specks and only 2 were under 15" with the rest being 17-21". Apparently the larger trout recover first as the water starts to warm.


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## Big Bay (May 14, 2013)

The things that you use for stingers never cease to amaze me lmao!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## pocjetty (Sep 12, 2014)

Big Bay said:


> The things that you use for stingers never cease to amaze me lmao!!


Aww man. How did you notice that? I'm usually pretty good about laughing at myself and admitting when I do something dumb. But I was gong to try to avoid mentioning this one. You wouldn't think a guy who has fished as much as I have, as long as I have, could do something that boneheaded once. But it sure couldn't happen twice in a week, right? Nope.

I took my BIL with me the day before. I had plenty of fish at home, so I gave him my fish when we were done - stringer and all. I have spares, so I told him I would just get that stringer back later. So the next morning I got to my fishing spot and... no stringer. Again. Only this time, my windbreaker didn't have a drawstring. But I had a little space heater in the bed of my truck that had started kicking breakers, and I was going to take it to the dump later. I cut the cord off with my fishing pliers. Poke a small hole in the fishes' mouths, and the plug makes a perfect stopper. Problem solved.

It's all about my routine. When I'm done wading, I always take my fish off the stringer and put them in the ice chest, then I put my stringer back into my wading belt. Both times, I just got off my routine, and didn't notice until I was at my fishing spot.

I meant to take that electric cord out of there before I took the picture, but the front had hit and I was cold and in a hurry. I almost didn't post the picture, but I thought, "Nobody will notice that little plug." Like they used to say on Scooby Doo: "And I would have gotten away with it, if it hadn't been for those meddling kids."

Nice catch. :biggrin:


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## Explorer123 (Oct 13, 2016)

A super report! I appreciate all the effort and expertise that you bring to this forum.
Have a great 2018.


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## WillieT (Aug 25, 2010)

Great report, as usual. Youâ€™re just being creative, use what you got.


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## barronj (Sep 30, 2013)

Stay tuned for next week's episode where pocjetty gets to the water with only a push mower and takes the pull-start rope off for a stringer, because "he forgot his gear again"

Sorry, sir, I had to. Love the reports, as always, no sparing any details ;^)


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## EliteBoatStorage (Nov 3, 2013)

Thank You. That was a fine report, very informative. Can't wait to get our place in Fulton up and going again. Stay Warm!


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