# Big Flounder and Big Gators - Rockport



## Redfish Rick (Aug 27, 2004)

The last 3 nights on the water have been challenging. Severe low tides, high winds, and bright full moon have combined for some tough nights lately. With high tide occurring at sunset the last few days, the flounder have abandoned the shallower flats early each night as the tide quickly falls out. I'm seeing lots of fresh "beds", but very few flounder left in the shallows as the tide falls. The average size of the fish is getting better, and we gigged 3 fish tonight in the 20-21" range.

The gators are also coming out to play in the last few nights, as the waters warm. Alligators are abundant in almost all the bays surrounding Rockport, and many people don't even realize they survive just fine in saltwater marsh areas. For now, we are only seeing the larger gators cruising the flats at night, as they are more tolerant of colder water temps. As the waters continue to warm, we should see more gators and plenty of hatching baby gators. Tonight we saw 3 gators, the smallest was around 7', and the largest was pushing 12'. Come summer time, is is not uncommon to see 10-20 gators in one night.

Video of gator in front of the boat while gigging, from last year:





*3/19/2014*
I had the John H. party of 5 on-board tonight. It was a tough night tonight, and we earned every fish brought aboard. Winds were dead calm most of the night, with a very low tide that was falling further. We hit 5 different spots, picking up 4-5 fish in each area. We covered a ton of ground tonight, with lots of empty water and vacant flounder beds, as a result of the falling tide. We ended with 16 flounder, 2 drum, and 1 sheepshead.

Capt. Rick Hammond
Night Stalker Guide Service - Rockport, Texas
361-727-0045
www.nightstalkerguideservice.com

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## Redfish Rick (Aug 27, 2004)

*Gigging RED HOT, again.....*

The last 2 nights of gigging saw much improved conditions on the flats, and resulted in quick limits for my customers. The tide level has slowly improved over the last 2 days, and the water is very clear at this point. Fish are making the transition to hard sand flats with emergent seagrass growth. The gigging is really heating up now, after a slow period early this week. I look for this trend to continue, with the best gigging occurring on nights with rising water levels.

*Reports from the last 2 nights:*

3/20/2014
I had the Kathy. M party of 3 on the boat tonight. We were greeted with perfect 5-10 mph SE winds and an incoming tide, up a few inches from the last few days. The fish were very shallow tonight, holding tight to structure and oyster shell. We ended with a 15 flounder limit plus two black drum, in 3 hours.

3/21/2014
I had the Gary W. group of 3 on the boat tonight, all the way from California and Illinois. The conditions were perfect, with a 10mph SE wind and rising tide. The fish tonight were situated a bit deeper over hard sand bottom. We gigged all our fish on the first stop of the night, in a little over 2 hours. We ended with a 15 flounder limit plus 1 black drum.

Capt. Rick Hammond
Night Stalker Guide Service - Rockport, Texas
361-727-0045
www.nightstalkerguideservice.com

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## Redfish Rick (Aug 27, 2004)

*Double Down*

*3/22/2014 - Double Down*
With perfect weather before the cold front, and plenty of flounder around, I ran 2 trips tonight. On the first trip I had the Doug G. group of 4, and we focused our efforts on hard sand bottom near the area where I found most of the fish the night before. We gigged our 20 fish limit plus 1 drum by 11:15 pm.

After filleting the first groups catch, I headed out with the Zach M. group of 2 at 12:30 am. Zach was originally booked for Sunday night, but with the higher north winds forecast for Sunday night, he made the decision to go when the weather was right and take the late shift tonight. Zach is a cadet at the Air Force academy in Colorado Springs, and this was his last day of spring break before heading home. We quickly found some larger flounder holding over mud bottom, getting our 10 flounder limit in 1 hour. After that, we searched for 2 more hours looking for some drum and sheepshead, but only saw a few undersize fish.

Capt. Rick Hammond
Night Stalker Guide Service - Rockport, Texas
361-727-0045
www.nightstalkerguideservice.com

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