Working vs Fishing: Week of March 10

This year New Orleans City Park’s Big Bass Rodeo & Fishtival will include a new division, Boats on the Bayou.

 

Spring has sprung in south Louisiana  and most of the week I was stuck inside working the Sunbelt conference basketball tournament. Congrats to UL Lafayette on winning the championship in dramatic fashion in overtime over Georgia state. Most of my fishing was done from the bank this week but I did sneak in two quick trips in the Hobie Outback.

   Monday 3/10 afternoon I went to Bayou St.John to begin preparations for the
upcoming Boats on the Bayou tournament. The water in the bayou was super clear and winds were light which allowed me to see the bottom in areas that were at least eight feet deep. I started on the north end of the bayou and made my way towards Interstate 6-10 bridge where I turned around.  This was a pretty average day for me on the bayou picking up a bass here and there.Until the highlight of the trip  when I decided to stand up and sight cast some bass because the area I was in was particularly clear. When I stood up I happened to be 10 feet away from a school of  about six redfish Headed straight for the Outback. I didn't catch any of them because they saw me about two seconds after I saw them and took off. I think I caught a total of 13 bass and missed a couple more. None of the bass were too special and the Largest went about twelve inches.

  Wednesday 3/12 night after work I decided to go to a secret area on the south shore of lake Pontchartrain and do a little bank fishing. This spot is super productive in the spring and last year and every night I was catching solid speckled trout that were two pounds and up as well as limits of slot redfish. I was a little too early and I don't think the fish were are there yet. I have been getting reports that the Lake Pontchartrain sea wall was producing a few Speckled trout. But give it another week and I will give you some reports of speckled trout that were caught from the bank.

  Thursday morning 3/13 I went back to Bayou St.John. There was a call to all kayak fishermen to help film a segment for Don Dubuc that would promote the boats on the bayou tournament. Everyone launched at Filmore Ave. where the filming would take place. I hung around there for a half an hour throwing a purple worm but I didn't catch anything. I don't like to fish in that area so I headed up towards Mirabeau to see what I could find. Once I got up there I found some small bass on the banks Five in total. I then headed back to Filmore where everyone was gone I had missed the whole taping of the segment. I decided to fish back down to Robert E Lee catching a few more small bass. I headed back to the truck and loaded up to go get ready for work.

  Sunday 3/16 After work I headed back to bayou St.John to do a little bank fishing. We caught a few bass mostly on a mini jig under a cork. I did have a six foot gar chase a swim bait all the way to the bank. After that i made my way down to another spot where a ton of bait fish getting crushed by something. Shortly after stopping  It started raining pretty hard which hid the surface action and I decided to go home. Overall I had a pretty fishy week. With two tournaments in two weeks coming up the end of this month is going to be extra fishy.

 Stay tuned for the third and final Redfish Rumble prefishing report on friday.