Here we are in December and the speckled trout are still here by the thousands. That’s right we are still catching one hundred trout trips by seven thirty in the morning. Of course we have only had two pretty hard cold fronts and that has drove the speckled trout in to our shallow lakes and duck ponds by the thousands. All the shrimp seem to have left for deeper water and the trout have move in and settled down for the fall and winter season. This is the time of the year we stop fishing with live shrimp and we change over to soft plastic. The way the trout are biting right now you would think we are still using live shrimp. This is one of the best years we have had back here in the last ten years as far as the amount and the size of speckled trout that have moved in to this region. Just remember fishing trout this time of the year you have to keep a close eye on the weather. What I mean by that is you know the cold fronts move through this area every seven to ten days. This time of the year you always want to try to fish two to three days after a cool front. The reason is that when the cool front moves through the area the north wind blows hard for about one to two days and that drains all the water out of the broken marsh and the shallow duck ponds. When that happens in such a short amount of time it moves the top layer of soft mud that has settled down on top of the bottom of these shallow waters. Well when the top mud moves with the hard falling tide it dirties up the water to the point that the speckled trout cannot swim around and see to feed. It makes it hard for them to extract the oxygen out of the water, so they will just find a deep hole somewhere and settle down until the wind stops blowing and the water cleans up. You can bank on it that as soon as the water cleans up the trout will start swimming around and they are very hungry. Keep in mind that they haven’t eaten in the last two days so they have one thing on there mind and that is eating. At this point they will just about feed on anything they see that looks like food. A lot of people I know have there bait they favor the most however I say it really doesn’t matter all that much because remember what I said about they haven’t eaten in the last forty eight to seventy two hours and they are starving. It really doesn’t matter if you do a cast and retrieve or if you just put a soft plastic three feet under a popping cork. I have been catching both ways, but you have to wait at least two days after a cool front. Normally they will feed all the way up to the next cool front and this cycle will repeat itself for the rest of the cold season. I normally see this cycle breaking up sometime in January when we start getting some really cold nights. The very low temperatures will drive the trout back out to the gulf of mexico for about a month or two. Once the first crop of small brown shrimp start showing up near the beach on the oyster reefs sometime in the latter part of March the speckled trout are not far behind. That is when we will start another spring season of catching beautiful trout on the oyster reefs near the barrier islands. The trout will hang around the oyster reefs for the month of March and April however towards the be-gaining of May the egg sacks are full of row and the bite is in full swing for the rest of the summer months. All in all we only seem to go through about six to eight weeks of not catching some nice trout around this area. That is the time of the year I like to make all repairs to my boat and equipment and it is really too cold to fish that time of the year anyway.
Fishing with family and friends is a great way to build memories that will last a life time. There is something about spending the day on the water with people that always seems to find a way for everyone involved to have a great time. As for the kids, believe me they will remember every moment of the day while on the water. I think that is why we grow up to love to fish as much as we do. I can remember that my mom and day would take us fishing every weekend during the fare weather months of the year. That is what we did for fun and it didn’t really cost that much money to entertain us for the day. As for entertaining corporate clients, I can’t think of a better way to get to know somebody then spending time on the water with them catching beautiful speckled trout. The day goes by so fast and you will be doing something all the time. You will not have a bunch of time to be bored while fishing around this area and will give you lots to talk about as you are entertaining your clients. Building memories while fishing for speckled trout and red fish is simply a fantastic way to not only get to know someone but to show a token of appreciation for the working relationship you already have in place with them. When it comes down to fishing for speckled trout during the summer months always remember this, if you don’t go, you don’t know. What I mean by that is just go fishing when the weather is good and I can promise you that you will have a great time and you will build lot’s of memories that will last a life time.
