# Flounder everywhere! - Epic night



## Redfish Rick (Aug 27, 2004)

The flats have really come to life in the last week. With warming water temps and recent rains, the fish are becoming much more active at night. While gigging last night, we saw massive schools of 200-300 keeper-size redfish working the shallow flats, they were followed by hoards of cownose rays and stingrays. Sheepshead are starting to make their transition to grassy shorelines, and small schools of drum are showing around the back lake drains. The biggest change in the last week is the baitfish of choice for these fish. The schools of reds and all the flounder we gigged were agressively feeding on small croaker, which seem to be everywhere in the shallows right now. It was truly an awesome sight, watching a school of reds attack a large school of 2" croaker in a shallow sand pocket. Gigging continues to be great, on nights where the wind and tides work together.

*5/10/2014 - Double trip*
I had the Jason B. group of 5 for the first trip tonight. Winds were SE at 15 with a very high tide, and slow outgoing current. We found the flounder stacked up along hard sand and oyster shorelines. Most of the fish were in very shallow water, and were actively feeding on the abundant hatch of croaker along these shorelines. Almost every fish was gorged with small 2" croaker. We had several times tonight were we could see 3-4 keeper flounder in front of the boat at one time, even 2 fish that were sitting on top of each other, for a rare double gig opportunity. We gigged our 25 flounder limit in 2 hours of gigging, making it one of the best trips this year.

After cleaning the first groups fish, I met the John B. group of 2 at 12:30 for the second trip of the night. Winds were now SE at 20, and the water was much dirtier. Most of the fish had moved out to deeper water by now, leaving behind fresh "beds" everywhere. John brought his bow along, shooting a few flounder and sheepshead along the way. We worked hard in dirty water to gig our 10 flounder limit plus 3 sheepshead in three hours of gigging. After cleaning the fish, I got home about 5:30am, a long night for sure!!!

Capt. Rick Hammond
Night Stalker Guide Service - Rockport, Texas
Flounder Gigging - Bay Fishing - Duck Hunting
361-727-0045
www.nightstalkerguideservice.com

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## Redfish Rick (Aug 27, 2004)

*Windy night - still gigging flounder*

*5/11/2014*
I had Bruce and Cheryl on the boat tonight, and conditions were as nasty as they get. Wind was 20-25mph SE with gusts over 30, and the tide was extremely high (up 8" from last night). To make things even worse, we had misty rain and drizzle most of the night. The water was dirty everywhere we went, and we rarely saw the bottom with the extreme high tides. We struggled to find fish for the first 3 hours, but then I got things dialed in over shallow oyster shell bottom, holding water with good clarity. In one area with oyster bottom, we gigged 7 fish in 5 minutes. The fish were sitting on top of the shell in 1-2" of water. We ended the night with 9 flounder (1 short). We should have had a limit, but we missed several fish and had a couple swim away before I could get the boat close enough. Not bad for a horribly windy night....

Capt. Rick Hammond
Night Stalker Guide Service - Rockport, Texas
Flounder Gigging - Bay Fishing - Duck Hunting
361-727-0045
www.nightstalkerguideservice.com

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