Shallow water, I caught red fish in tire tracks

[GoDoe]

On Friday I went exploring looking for some shallow water. To me that means 1' or less and exploring means following any bit of water to its very end.

So, I find myself in some prime looking flood water around noon on Friday with a few black drum in it. I waded for an hour with only one fish to hand. The water is off color and the drum have adapted to it by becoming almost silver. Most of the fish I saw was upon bumping them and watching them head the other way.

At about 1:30, after a sandwich and a couple of phone calls, I started to see a few drum tails popping up. I even cast to one from my seat at lunch. The big wide opaque tail popped up 20' from my Solo as I sat eating my lunch. No hook up there.

I will give away the end of the story now and then give some details later. In the next 2 hours I caught 10 red fish and 4 more black drum. It was fabulous. Seemed like every drum I cast to chased and inhaled the fly and the reds...........well I just don't think anybody would believe this story.

All the reds came in water 8" or less. I was following an inlet that led along a long curvy creek to a pond at the end. I am talking 50' across, circled with mangroves, pond. From that pond there was a small drain that led up on to what is normally dry land. The Solo would barely fit through the opening into the pond and for sure would not have fit through the drain.

So I got down from poling and walked out the drain. Really just going to see the end to mark it off the list. This turns out to be the best decision I have made all day. The drain is knee deep and runs for 100 yds, winding thru the scattered mangroves and ending up flattening out on to what is normally the beach/dry land. On both sides of the drain is flood water from 6" to 1" deep. On the way in I can see two nice reds, in the 25" range, moving around. I put the black crab fly close enough for them to eat but they ignored it.

I noticed a small red outside the drain loafing along in the flood water. He was aggressive on his pickup of the crawling black crab fly and for the next hour I was chasing and hooking up on his brothers. I could see these fish cruising on this sandy flat from 70' away and when they encountered a lowly black crab they were more than happy to have a go. I got 3 fish over 25" along with 6 more, from 12" to 22", in the same manner. I was fishing literally in vehicle tracks in the sand. It is no exaggeration that someone could have driven their truck to where I was into this 6" of water and probably caught these fish by sight casting from the bed.

For whatever reason the tide was moving in and these fish, like I had done, were following the water as far as they could go. And that was a beautiful sight, multiple red fish cruising around on a bare sand flat in 6" of water and when they saw something dragging along the bottom, they ate it!

John

[TigerLandSportsman]

Sounds like a good day.

Very well written report

[flydoc]

Gotta luv them cow pastures--- WTG John

[Drifting Yak]

Now that's a great story! Congrats!

[Cuervo Jones]

Man! That's cool. It pays to go exploring into the far reaches of the backwaters. You never know WHAT's back there!


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[kickingback]

Go shallow man, go shallow! You got a great outing there Sir! I like those days for sure!

[karstopo]

I think redfish were once some land animal driven to find a way to get back on Tierra firma. Or maybe they just like the change of diet offered by flooded pasture. "Honey, can we get some fiddler crab or anything else for lunch besides these fish and shrimp we seem to always eat". "Sure, follow me, I know just the spot"

Thanks for your report.