November 2023 fishing Report

The weather here is the limiting factor on our fishing. When we first got here it was so hot and humid that we stayed inside. In Wyoming we rarely use our air conditioner, and when we had a house, we didn’t have air conditioning for thirty years. Here it’s a must. We did manage to have some breaks in the weather and have gotten out three times. The first time was at Goose Island State Park, where we caught small, speckled trout, an alligator gar, and small sand trout. Its always fun to catch fish but we had hoped for some to eat. A week later the wind was down, and Renita and I took our kayaks out to our favorite spot. Arriving we were dismayed to see a boat sitting on it. We fished in other places with no luck. Finally the boat left the spot and we paddled frantically to the shell ridge.

On the first cast I caught an eighteen-inch sheepshead! It’s one of our favorite eating fish along with black drum, pompano, flounder, and speckled trout. Lots of people here love redfish, and while we do keep ones for grilling on the half shell, its down our list of fish to eat, (leaving the skin on and grilling the fillet). The flesh is somewhat coarse compared to our other favorites. It was Renita’s turn next, and she caught several speckled trout, a nice sting ray, and even wound in a blue crab! I got lucky and added a keeper speckled trout. Just before we left. Renita landed a large sting ray and the biggest speckled trout of the day, over sixteen inches! This all happened in less than two hours before the wind came up and we had to leave. It was starting to whitecap. Our kayaks are small and while we could handle the waves it’s too hard to paddle and so we headed back to our car..

On our third trip we returned to the state park. This time the speckled trout were hitting and we both caught several but Renita took the cake. I had to go back to the car and when I returned, she was fighting a nice fish on my pole! We were both surprised when she landed a nice pompano. Usually, we only catch them while surf fishing and this was the first and largest pompano we have caught! I later filleted the fish, and the two fillets were more than we could eat at one setting. So the fishing has been good, when we get out, and we have had three meals from our catches. There is nothing better than fresh fish. However, another cold front, with strong winds, has passed through and it looks like we won’t get out till next Wednesday.