Freshwater Fishing
Goggle-eye chunky in Basin
I’ve always been taught catching a fish on the first cast is bad luck, so when my cork dipped beneath the surface of the water this morning (May 4) I was a little hesitant to set the hook.[…]
Freshwater Fishing
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A Man and a Fish
Following my GPS, I tentatively nosed my truck through the fortress-like gates of Mariners Cove in Slidell. When the man invited me to hunt alligator gar in the canal behind his house, I had just kind of assumed that the trail would lead me to a rural backwater retreat in the salt marshes between Slidell and Lake Pontchartrain.[…]
Freshwater Fishing
Bay Cat Hot Spots
Anglers looking for a few locations to catch bay cats, both blues and channels, should start on the west side of East Cote Blanche Bay near Point Moroon, at the mouth of Bayou Carlin, Humble Canal and Jackson Bayou on the west side of the Bay.[…]
Freshwater Fishing
Frabill Crawler Can
Fish catfish with worms long enough and chances are quite good that many will die in the wax-coated cardboard or styrofoam containers they come in.[…]
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Buggin’ bluegill
The sounds are unmistakable. SSSLURP! POP! SMACK!
When bluegill rise to grab surface meals, they know they’re vulnerable to bass, ospreys, herons and other predators. Therefore, they have to be sure of a worthwhile payoff, and nature provides plenty in the way of aquatic insects and other bugs that fall to the water’s surface.[…]
Freshwater Fishing
Popping out poppers and other popular patterns
My colleague and accomplished fly tier, Reb Stewart recently gave me a box of foam-bodied poppers and various insect patterns. The colors looked good, the legs and antennae, etc. all set just right.[…]
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Bear Bayou Bream Basics
The anchor hadn’t settled on the bottom good before my wife made her first cast toward the trees along a stretch of Bear Bayou we regularly fish. As normal, she wasn’t playing around.[…]
Freshwater Fishing
Favorite bream rig
Fishing bream doesn’t take any special equipment or bait. A small trout worm on a No. 4 Aberdeen-style hook is preferred.[…]
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Pocket Perch
When I first moved to New Orleans as a (very) young man in the mid-1960s, I just knew that I was a fishing hot dog. I thought I knew all there was to know about catching bass, bream, white perch and catfish — and that’s where the fishing world ended.[…]
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Double dipping
The craggy man at the bow controls of the boat turned off the boat’s engine. He lit a cigarette and scanned the points formed by the intersection of the Texaco Canal and Grand Bayou.[…]
Freshwater Fishing
The scribe
Jim Looney is more than the average angler, with 12 fishing booklets to his credit. The books focus on how to catch bass, bream and sac-a-lait in the Grand Bayou-Lake Verret area, as well as the Atchafalaya Basin, and redfish and speckled trout in Pointe au Chien.[…]
Freshwater Fishing
No fancy stuff
Modern bass fishermen are known for their endless array of fancy and expensive equipment. Fishing with Jim Looney is like a throwback to a simpler time, a time when it seemed like any angler could be reasonably confident of catching bass.[…]
Freshwater Fishing
The 14-inch minimum:
The 14-inch-minimum-size limit on all black bass — both largemouth and spotted — in the Atchafalaya Basin, Lakes Verret, Palourde, Fausse Point/Dauterive areas has been in effect since the aftermath of Hurricane Andrew in 1992.[…]
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Stump field slabs
Every year during March and April, fishermen hammer Lake D’Arbonne’s shallow cypress trees and banks for spawning white perch (aka crappie or sac-a-lait). It’s a mad rush because you only have a few weeks to take advantage of the relatively easy bite.[…]
Freshwater Fishing
Best equipment
While shiners can be used to fish for post-spawning crappie, most fishermen ease through the stump fields fishing about 10 feet deep with jigs.[…]
Freshwater Fishing
Where to go
Lake D’Arbonne is located near Farmerville in north-central Louisiana, and there are several public boat ramps providing easy access to the stump fields in the Stowe Creek, Terral Island and Bear Creek areas of the lake.[…]