Just Another Day on the Water in Delcroix, La

December to Remember

 

While fall fishing took a little longer than usual to kick in this year, the recent string of cold fronts have definitely had the trout on the move and their transition into our interior marshes is now in full force.  While they have been showing up in low numbers in their usual winter spots, the fall areas have been on fire throughout the gulf areas of the state, it seems every person I talk to is slinging limits of yellow mouths over the gunnels every day.

This month I had the opportunity to get on the water with some local superstars, in their own minds of course, and pick their brains about different topics that they are passionate about.  As I arrived at Rigolets Marina an hour before the sun was set to rise, I was met by Ranger Pro and local guide of In & Out Charters, Capt. Bubby Lamy, and General Manager, third generation owner of Double D Meat Co, Josh Stogner.   These are two individuals that want nothing more than to succeed in everything they do, whether it’s putting fish over the rail for clients, or making sure that your family is getting the best country smoked sausage there is, these guys are not only good at what they do, but they are proud of it.

Capt. Bubby is a native of south Louisiana, a family man, a father of three, an inspiration to many, and a captain that strives to make sure you’re smiling the entire day on the water.  With over 30 years of experience fishing the waters of Louisiana mixed with a personality so entertaining it’s contagious, you can’t help but have a good time.

Josh is also a native a south Louisiana, a family man, a father of two, and a provider to many of us throughout the country when it comes to the best smoked sausage around.  With more years of experience in the processing industry than he wants to admit, being the third generation of the family owned Double D Meat Co., Josh has worked long and hard to perfect their meats and grow their business into a national sensation to taste buds, all while carrying on the family traditions and values that his previous generations started nearly 50 years ago.

With the sky still black and the wind beginning to blow, Capt. Bubby pointed the bow of his Ranger Bay 2510 south and let loose on the 300 Yamaha horses and we were on our way.  The throttle stayed steady until we made it to our first destination, “the wall”.  As we arrived at the large locks, it was a sunrise of great proportions, the sun was shining on the tugs pushing the barges along the ICW, the tips of the Paris Rd Bridge or “green monster” were shining, and for a minute it seemed that everything stood still.  But just as I was attempting to take a few pictures I was reminded by the comical captain that it’s now fishing time.  We made our way to the back corner section south of the gates and nosed our way slowly closer to the wall, Bubby and I were jigging Matrix shad in Lemon Head and Limbo Slice, while Josh was Carolina rigging live shrimp.  Within minutes Josh was hooked up and it didn’t take us long to figure out it wasn’t a trout as the drag was screaming off the reel.  Josh hooked into a gorgeous redfish that did everything he could in his attempt to elude the net, he made runs around several crab pot buoys, of which we had to unwrap by hand while Josh continued to fight the beast, and after what seemed like 10 minutes, we finally had the first fish in the boat.  During this time a couple other boats had pulled up and started working the back corner of the area.  As we high fived and took a few pictures, we were quick to get back to the task at hand.  Within minutes there were trout flying into the boat from every direction.  After 10 or 15 yellow mouths in the box, Capt Bubby decided to make a move, his sights weren’t set on just catching trout, he wanted to catch big trout, and so with that in mind, we cranked up and moved to another section of the wall about a mile or two away.

As we arrived at location number two, there wasn’t a boat in sight. Bubby positioned the boat along the wall in an effort to set us all up working a small ledge in 27 feet of water, and as expected, the trout began flooding the floor of the Ranger Bay.   These trout were all keepers and a little bigger, but still not what Bubby was looking for.  After about 30 minutes and another 20 trout bubby decided it was time to move again, but this time he gave us options.  Bubby looked at Josh and asked him if he had ever sight fished reds, and with as straight a face as one can have, Josh simply said. “Nope, but I’m open for anything.”

That’s all it took, you could see the excitement on Bubby’s face, he was like a kid on Christmas morning, and I just knew what lied ahead for Josh was going to be an experience he would never forget. 

As we arrived in the middle of nowhere, all you could see was crystal clear water and marsh grass for miles.  Bubby and Josh got in the front of the boat and I climbed up the T top and was perched like a bald eagle searching for his next meal.  Bubby knew these waters well and was able to almost point out the fish before we could even see them.  With matrix shad hooked up to spinner blades, the flash and thump was too much for these reds to resist.  First it was one red here and one red there, and then it was schools of reds cornered in the back of ponds.  Once Josh got his bearings and understood what to look for and where in the column the reds were swimming, it didn’t take him long to get in on the action landing his first sight fished redfish.  Within a couple of hours there were three limits of quality redfish on ice and I’m pretty sure some of the stories throughout the day will be recalled and shared for years to come.

Running a business is never easy and running a family business can have added consequences and pressures being you’re becoming part of something that is bigger than you, and the last person you ever want to let down is your own family.  So with that in mind, I asked Josh how he became involved in the family run Double D Meat Co, when did he know he wanted to continue the family tradition, and what keeps him motivated? Without hesitation, Josh quickly responded, “As a teenager I worked at the plant during my summer and Christmas breaks from school, so I knew at that time I wanted to stay in the family business when I graduated. I’ve learned a lot from my Dad Mike and Uncle Tillman, two of the greatest all around men I know, who trust me to run the family business just as Grandpa Dutch trusted them. We strive every day to continue to produce a high quality product that our loyal customers love and we continue to treat our customers as friends. Whether we are called D&D, Two D’s or Double D it gives us a sense of pride when we hear customers say they grew up eating our sausage and in their eyes there is no other. We’ve been blessed and try to help the community whenever we are able.”

Double D has been serving our community for 48 years strong and has always had a family atmosphere over the last 30 plus years I’ve been going there.  They can ship to anywhere in the U.S. by request and can be found at all of your local and major food chains.  As for their processing operations of wild game, I don’t drop my deer of anywhere except DD in Bogalusa, and now when you drop off your venison you can even enter your deer by weight into their big buck competition to win a wide array of high end prizes.

I did an article earlier this year on Double D Meat Co and the myth of whether or not you get your own meat back after you drop it off.  Well we already dispelled that myth, and getting to know Josh and seeing who he is as a person says a lot about the family touch that is put into their products, and based on the success of their company, the quality of their meat, taste of their meat, and the instilled family values that Josh portrays, there is no question why they have they have been dubbed, “Home of Country Smoked Sausage.” 

Quotes

Josh, what did you think about the trip? “It was a great day of fishing; Sight fishing from an elevated position was a 1st for me but won’t be the last. Any day on the water fishing with good people is a good day but putting fish in the boat makes it a great day. “

Capt Bubby, what did know about DD Meats? “Double D is my favorite smoke sausage, I’ve tried the rest now I eat the best, Double D Smoked Sausage.”

Capt Bubby, what is it that draws you to chartering and to fishing in general? “Although fishing is about catching fish for most people, it’s not everything. It’s the friendships and the enjoyment you have trying to catch them that’s everything.”

 

 

High Water and Changing Patterns

 2015 has been a phenomenal year fishing for me,  from traveling across the country fishing a freshwater kayak series to stepping into the IFA redfish tour Boat division to running more charters than I have ever imagined, it's been amazing.
As I sit here watching it rain and listening to the clock tick ever so slowly in anticipation of the LSU vs Alabama game tonight at 7pm, I can't help but think of how I have let my blog slowly decrease in activity over the past several months.  For a couple years now I have worked hard to build an audience and an avenue where I could share my experiences, successes, and failures, and to those that follow my reports, I apologize.  So today is the day where I get back on track and refocus on doing what I love, sharing the outdoors with anyone and everyone that's willing to listen or read about it.
 Lately our waters have been in a constant change in south Louisiana.  One day the waters in Delacroix are 4 feet low and the next they are 4 feet above normal and there is water running over the highway.  Situations like this can present a boat yard of pinballs throughout the marsh bouncing around like crazy hitting every bumper they can in an attempt to catch fish.  The sight fishing guys get bummed because now there are 24 foot bay boats sitting in the middle of their shallow water hotspot popping corks in waters that they normally can't get in, the duck hunters are bummed because its 80 degrees out when it should be 50 or 60, and the marsh is so flooded the ducks have endless opportunities to eat and hide in newly formed flooded ponds, and the kayak guys get challenged by the rate of speed the water is falling and 10 paddle strokes now equals only a few feet of travel at times.  With all this change that can drive anglers insane, there is always one thing that is constant, fish need to eat.
 While we can't always pick the best days to hit the water, like when the sun is shining, the pressure is low, and the tide is at 1.2 feet and falling, it's up to us to adapt to what's going on.  I won't ever pretend to know everything outdoors, and while it seems my mind is fading more and more with every year of age I endure, I have learned a few things over the years that have helped me continually fill the box in tough times and in times that matter.
 Right now the trout are moving in, or for a better term, have moved in.  Over the past week, myself and my clients have landed trout from 10 inches to 23 inches with several pushing the 5 to 6 lbs mark.  We have caught them in 18 inches of water while sight fishing reds, and in 30 feet of water jigging plastics.  We have pulled reds from deep in the grass chasing shrimp in just a couple of inches of water to drop shotting plastics and dead shrimp in 20 feet of water.  The patterns haven't held for days on end, one day it's shallow, one day its points, one day is channel bends, one day it's deep holes or choke points.  But that's what's great about fall fishing, the fish seem to be everywhere, and while I am confident that some scientist somewhere can break down exactly why and when our fish do what they do, I have always found that trial and error produce more consistent results through sticking and moving rather than sticking to a plan that you read about somewhere.
 Here are a  few of the steps that I have been walking lately that have kept the box full whether the sun was shining or the rain was falling, both in shallow water and high.
If the water is extremely high and the tide is falling out fast, go deep for trout and reds in a man channel with a drop shot set up.  A main channel being one that the marsh is draining into and then it is draining into an even bigger channel.  I don't mean just roll up into Bayou terre aux boeuf and start slinging drop shots, but as a point of reference, bayou terre aux bouf would be considered the "bigger channel" .  Try a couple spots like this and find what works, if that's not working move shallow, find some drains that are filtering out of the marsh itself, these would be small cuts that you wouldn't dare put your boat into, but if the current is falling out of it from the endless grassy marshes around, try the mouths of them.  Don't just hit one and give up, hit 5 or 6 of them and when you find one producing, work it until it stops producing, move on to another, and then circle on back again and see if it has become active again.  There are days when I may stop at 15 different locations and only 3 of them produce, but they continue to produce all day long if you keep giving them a break to explore other areas. 
If you want to move on from the marsh and go into really deep water to try your luck, the most consistent thing I've seen lately is that the bottom is golden.  If your lure isn't reaching the bottom, odds of you being out fished
 are 10 fold.  I watched a client this past week catch trout off the back of the boat 7 to one to her partner on the front of the boat.  It wasn't the location or a special reef she was fishing, the only difference in the presentation was that she let her lure get all the way to the bottom.  When going deep this week, you have to learn patience, not necessarily patience for the bite, but that 10 to 12 seconds of stagnant time anxiously awaiting your lure to reach the strike zone.  It's a great time to hit your reels
 with a little lubrication, Reel Magic or whatever you normally use to keep your equipment in top shape.
While the sight fishing game is still going on as our waters continue to clear up, keep in mind it is duck season and most ducks fly early and get shot
 at early, so if you're headed to the shallow ponds, let the sun get high, redfish will bite all day.  With a short season on big ducks, let those guys have their fun, and you can come in later in the day and have yours.
I hope some of this is useful for you and helps in putting together a plan that will help you land more fish, but at the same time encourage you to step out of your normal comfort zone and find new areas to fish, and new techniques to use during high water tides.
As the water begins to recede following all of east winds that have flooded our marshes, I'll follow this up with some shallow water tactics based on
 what's happening out there as we get into a normal fall/winter water level or pattern.

Until Next Time,

Good luck, Stay Safe, & Catch1

Childhood Waters...Bassin on the Tchefuncte River

 

 
 
As Auburn pulled out a win by the skin of their teeth. and the bulldogs intercepted the razorbacks with 10 seconds left in the game to continue their national ranking of #1, I was pretty excited when my head hit the pillow.  I had no plans for the next day, and I knew I was going to gain an hour of sleep according to the clock man.  But somehow, some way, I woke up at 5 a.m., which was actually 4am, and after failing in my attempts to go back to sleep I decided to get up and do something.
When I walked outside, everything was covered in frost, it's the first I have seen this year and the temp was 39 degrees.  I was excited to say the least, so I wondered into the garage and began riggings some poles.  I figured I had to run by my dads today, so why not stop and fish a little before I got there.  With that in mind, I loaded up my gear, slid the Outback in the back of the truck, kissed my wife goodbye and headed out.

It was the longest drive ever, a solid 8-9 minutes away before I reached my destination, pretty neat to be able to fish so close to the house.  When I reached my launch location on the upper end of the Little Tchefuncte river, I couldn't help but think about all the time I had spent in the area growing up.  My parents still live on the river, where I was raised, and this is what I would consider my "true" stomping grounds. 
With the air in the 30's and the water temp at 63 degrees, there was an awesome foggy smoke rising from the water.  The sun was shining through the cypress trees and creating rays of light as it penetrated the fog.  There was no wind and no clouds, not really what I would call the perfect bass fishing atmosphere, but at this point, it was more about getting back to basics and living in my younger years.
As I crossed the water, I was glued to my Lowrance. As a kid, I didn't have any technology on my flat boat and I had to figure everything out by losing lures on sunken tree tops and blow downs.  I immediately crossed over what looked like a tree that came out of the Swiss Family Robinson book.  There was no way I was going to leave the water, until I pulled at least one bass from that tree top, but right now I wanted to work some cypress knees and flats that I knew were lying along the edge of a 16-25' channel in places.
Believe it or not, my third cast with my favorite Jig & Craw, by Bad Boy Jigs, yielded me a beautiful Tchefuncte bass. Now, I have fished the Tchefuncte river more times than I have put fuel in a car, and I guarantee you, it's no easy place to fish, and it sure isn't a place where you catch anything on your third cast, but today was a special day.
From there I moved down river to a canal known as Horseshoe Bayou.  Eventually I found a pattern where the bass were holding tight to structure, and only in water around 4-5' deep.  If you didn't slide your jig down the edge of the tree or stump, they weren't going for it.  I had one instance where my placement was off, on one cypress tree particularly.  I sat my lure 2 feet to the left, then 2 feet right, then two feet short, and when I finally stood up and flipped it into the trees bark and let is slowly slide along the tree as it fell, a bass destroyed it.  This pattern stayed around for a while until the sun finally broke the trees.
At this point I moved on to the spinner bait, and the only strikes I had was when I slow rolled the lure around a tree and made the blades thump the trees bark as it rolled around it, and as soon as it cleared the tree, I would make one 2 foot fast pull, and then let the spinner drop, and three fish almost back to back to back, hammered it this way.
I have now been on the water less than two hours and I wanted to make it back home for noon, and I still had to pass by my dads house, so with that in mind, I grabbed my Live Target crank bait and began my short journey back to the truck.  On the way back, I paralleled the ledges along the deep drops.  Each ledge had 5-15 feet of flat along it that stretched from the drop off back to the bank.  As I ran the crank bank down the flat and off the ledge, the bass were destroying it as soon as the lure broke free from digging up mud on the flat and dove quickly down to the abyss.  The fish were suspended 4-5 feet deep off the ledge in 15-25 feet of water.
After a few bass on the Live Target, I had to make a move back to my Swiss Family Robinson tree.  As I got there I made a drift over it again, and prepared my strategy, I grab the jig & craw, and dropped it right in the tree top.  Pulled it over two limbs, and on the third drop a nice little Kentucky bass was hooked up.  After the release, I moved to the other side of the tree that was sitting in 12 feet of water, and did the same thing, except this time, as I pulled the jig over one limb, another Kentucky hammered it.  At this point I felt like I was sitting on a school of fish, but unfortunately I had to go.
I ended the morning with less than 3 hours on the water and 9 bass landed.  To say the least, it was a very successful unplanned day, and I can promise you that I will be spending more time in the coming months working the creeks and channels of the Tchefuncte and getting back to the basics of fishing. 
I have spent thousands of miles on the road this year chasing fish of many different species, but nothing brings you back like playing in your back yard.  Todays trip was almost spiritual, as the sun rose, the fog lifted, and the moss began to blow in the wind, the fish were finicky in their ways, but when you served it up like they wanted, they attacked it with fury.  Every fish this morning reminded me of a childhood trip, I could remember trees and points where I had landed fish before, cypress knees that we used to have trot lines tied too, the trees where the snakes used to fall from, and the overhangs you avoided because there was always a giant wasp nest there waiting on you. 
If you haven't been on the Tchefuncte river lately, you may want to visit it, it's one of the only places around here, that I know of, where everything is still the same as it was almost 40 years ago.

Until next time,

Stay Safe & Catch1