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Big redfish season is here…

September is when we start getting very busy. Although the big fish have not moved into the shallows we are still able to target them in open water with the weather permitting(reasonable winds and sunlight)… This will continue usually through mid October when a good cold front pushes the bigger fish shallow. Although we have had some smaller cold fronts this October the majority of the bigger fish have not moved in yet.  This mixed with some serious winds have made fishing this month no easy task… Don’t get me wrong, we have had a couple days with great weather that we have had great fishing but over all it’s been tough.  We have had to grind it out, luckily we have a very healthy fishery and we can usually fall back inside and chase some smaller fish in protected waters.


  
  
  
  
  
  

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Fly fishing for Jack Crevalle in New Orleans’ backyard…

Starting in June schools of mullet start moving into Lake Ponchartrain. Following these schools is one of my favorite and most overlooked gamefish, Jack Crevalle aka Marsh tuna aka Jackie boy…  With the right conditions the lake clears showing its vast sand flats littered with small grass patches.  The jacks cruise up and down the shore crushing bait, pushing wakes, sometimes they just slow swim finning very much like a permit.  The season usually starts mid to late June, peaks july – mid sept then tapers off just in time for big redfish season.  My go to fly is the white popper pictured below but sometimes we do throw large baitfish patterns. I’d recommend at least a 10 wt rod.  If I’m fishing I’m throwing a 12 wt.  All jacks can fight our jacks are big and they fight. Average size is 20-30 lbs. Rarely do we see fish under 20.

 
  
  

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