My second fishing trip was into Trinity Bay, near Baytown, see “[Trinity Bay – A Bigger Pull On The Line]” and almost fifty years later, after catching some really big fish during the intervening years, I enjoyed what must have been the biggest pull yet!

Several times Bob Baugh and I took a course of around two hundred degrees out of the Freeport Jetties, to a block of oil rigs, sixty-five miles out into the Gulf of Mexico. Our objective was the abundant, at the time, hoard of large amberjack that lived around these rigs.

We were heading out in his twenty-three foot Formula that packed two, hundred and sixty-five, horsepower I/O’s. He’d rebuilt this boat, it was very sea worthy, had a real deep, vee and we’d been in some rough stuff and made it out just fine! Several times we’d been out over a hundred miles in it, without a hiccup, but today’s trip was only sixty-five.

We stopped at the first rig in the field, tied up to it, baited our fishing, rigs, with squid and cut mullet and let our lines down a hundred feet to the bottom. That day we were using heavy, six foot boat rods, Penn Senator reels packed with eighty pound line, heavy wire leaders along with a stainless steel, hook, heavy rigs for the heavy work we hoped we would encounter. For the time, we also had, high, tech (ha-ha), rod holders that we had strapped on.

As I was fitting the rod butt into my holder, my bait hadn’t completely settled on the bottom when I had a big hit! The fish picked up the bait running and ran right back into the rig structure, cutting me off. Bob was a little quicker and got his fish’s head up and started tugging it toward the surface. His tugs were futile as the fish, probably a big grouper or amberjack, dove back into the rig and cut him off too!

Reeling up our slack lines, we decided we’d tighten the drags almost all the way down and try to strong arm them up. Same story as our baits hit the bottom, strikes right away, but this time there was no give in our lines. Talk about a fight, both fish pulled, pulled and pulled some more. Even with our high tech rod holders, neither one of us, both stout fellows, could raise our rods off of the boat’s gunnels, but finally the fish began tiring. After a ten minute, tug-of-war, keeping my line tight, I put a flying gaff into Bob’s big, amberjack, we guessed a fifty pounder.

Still fighting my fish, a twin to Bob’s, we were fiddling around getting his amberjack aboard and into the cooler. Mine got its second wind and down it went. Stopping the run short of the rig, I manhandled it back to the surface and the flying gaff, applied by Bob, calmed it down. Whew, these two big, amberjacks almost filled up our big, cooler and almost wore us both out!

Letting our lines down again toward the bottom, Bob had a big hit about half way down. Setting the hook, down the fish bored, but he stopped it short and began the battle to get it to the surface. My bait was on the bottom, still untouched and loosening my drag, I set my rod in the through gunnel, holder and got the flying gaff ready.

Leaning over preparing to gaff Bob’s big ‘un, in the water below it was another monster, amberjack, half again as big. It was lazily coming to the surface. Looking into the water, we couldn’t believe it, but here came ten or fifteen more of the bruisers up to the top, where they just lolled around until the disturbance of getting Bob’s fish aboard spooked the school and they flushed. They went down much faster than they had floated up.

We crammed the last amberjack, a thirty pounder, into the cooler and kept fishing, but the amberjacks had developed a severe case of lockjaw! We did add a couple of red snappers to our bag, but up came a storm and chased us on in.

The school of huge amberjacks coming to the surface was a once in a lifetime deal! I’ve heard of snapper schools coming up and turning the surface red, but I’ve not seen that either. Our cooler was full of big fish and all the way in we wondered what we’d done if we had hooked one of the real big ‘uns.

We got lucky on this shrimp boat and snapped this picture just as it was pulling in its net. Birds can be seen working the spill as the net comes up.

We were lucky because the crew would start culling the catch as soon as the net was dumped. The culling and throwing of the by-catch overboard would jump start the food chain and the predators should gather around eagerly gobbling everything up.

Just as dawn was breaking on this late June morning in 1986, we, Bob Baugh, Charley King and I had cleared the Freeport Jetties and headed out on a hundred and ninety degree course, looking for anchored, shrimp boats. We were lucky to find our first one just pulling in the net and circled it until the crew started culling.

Pulling up beside the boat and starting our drift, we put out our lines. Our rigs were six and a half foot, medium action rods, reels loaded with thirty pound, line, a three foot steel leader and a sharp, single hook. Our first drift wasn’t productive so after two hundred yards we pulled back up alongside the shrimper and started another drift.

We were watching the chum floating, some was sinking, when we saw the flash of a predator fish, probably a kingfish. Just after this, Charley’s line took a big hit. He set the hook, the fish took off peeling thirty yards of line off of the reel and all he could do was hold on. Relenting to the rod’s pressure the fish soon came to gaff and we saw it was a small, barracuda, Sphyraena. Here Charley is holding it up for a picture and the fish’s distinctive markings are easy to see. Since barracudas aren’t good to eat, we threw it back.

Soon Bob and I were both hooked up with bigger fish and after spirited fights, we gaffed and boxed them, almost identical fifteen pound, kingfish, or king mackerel, Scomberomorus cavalla. We caught eleven all told, ten kings and the one barracuda and the action was hot and heavy until the crew stopped culling. Then, like a light switch that’s turned off, the fish quit hitting.

We kept looking for another hour, then ran over to a production, oil rig and tied off to it, hoping to hook up with a snapper or amberjack. No luck this time, just small ones, and since we had a good mess of fish we decided to beat the heat and head back in.

Overall, a good fishing trip and a lucky fishing trip!

Layla and I had taken a long weekend in late June at our beach house in Bayou Vista and Monday morning turned out to be “one of those days”. The tide was coming in all morning, light wind out of the southeast and all of “the weekenders” had gone home.

Since the conditions were picture perfect, we were going to fish around the wreck in West Galveston Bay. I’d always had a soft spot in my heart for the wrecked, shrimp boat that lay less than a hundred yards off of the old Intercoastal Waterway channel. One problem! The last big, low pressure, system that had come this way had knocked down the exhaust pipe of the boat and there wasn’t anyway to find the old wreck.

Being sure that I could find the general area, we headed out the “back way” to West Bay. Two years before, Randy and I headed out this very same way and he had run my Whaler into the reef beside the small cut, “unhorsing me”, see [“A Close Call”]. But, the big twenty-two footer had no problem, gliding close to the marker, flying across the Intercoastal and heading on into the bay. Just think, this boat would run flat out in twelve inches of water! Here’s a picture of it in the sling at our beach house.

Finding the general area of “the wreck” we both cast out. Layla was using a spinning outfit with eight pound; line, popping cork, three foot, leader, topped off with a nice, live shrimp. By the way, she never learned how to successfully attach the shrimp to the hook, but I gladly did this chore. My outfit was the same, but I had a seven and a half foot popping rod that hurled my shrimp out as far as her spinning rig.

Working and popping the corks, mine went under first and I was rewarded with a real, pole bender! The trout made one good run, then wallowed on the top of the water, came into the boat, then the fun started! The trout made me do the “West Bay Shuffle” around the boat twice, before the combination of the long fight and the rod’s pressure, had it laying on the top. Layla netted it and we both admired the six pounder, before I released it.

Layla caught two nice eating size specs that we boxed for today’s lunch and noticing that we’d drifted out of the catching zone, I doubled back, swinging wide, and started the drift pattern again. Again, my first cast was met with another hard strike and same song, second verse. This spec was a twin to my first one, another six pounder that we released. We both caught some eating size specs that we put into the cooler and decided that we’d call it a day and head back in.

Getting back, as Layla washed out the boat, I filleted the fish. We put one freezer bag up for future use and took two nice fillets up into the house and fried them up. Taking two pieces of white bread, adding some tartar sauce, then slapping on the fried fish, yum-yum! Adding some ice tea, this made a meal fit for a king and a perfect ending to our long weekend!

When WWII ended, my Grandma Bryan lived in Marlin, Texas, three miles out on Rock Damn Road. She owned acreage and the house was set back from the road and when you turned into the drive, it crossed over a large embankment making a natural damn that most of the time, except for periods of extreme drought, held water. This water also held plenty of crawdads!

We, my cousins and neighbor boys, would spend our time “fishing” for these crawdads. Through trial and error, we found out that if a piece of bacon from Grandma’s smoke house was securely tied to a piece of kite line, the crawdads would tenaciously hold on to the bacon even while they were lifted from the water. Then we would drop them into a net, separate them from the bacon and drop them into a glass dish.

We never could get Grandma or our Mothers to fry up our catch so, dedicatedly, after the dish had several crawdads in it, we practiced catch and release. We determined that if we caught all of ‘em, we couldn’t spend our time fishing for them

Once, to my surprise, I tried to grab a larger, one behind his pinchers, but it was quicker than me and inflicted a painful pinch to my finger. Another time we caught, what I now would call, an Opelousas Red. Maybe not a real Red, but this one was much larger than the others and very, very aggressive, not wanting to yield its bacon to our prying fingers. It would rare up on its tail and wave its claws menacingly at us, then attack when we tried to grab the bacon. We used a broom to shoo it back into the water and then quickly moved to another location around the pond.

A great drought hit our State in the late 40’s, the crawdad pond went dry for several years and they moved out and never took up residence there again. Last year, on one of my morning walks, what did I come across but a crawdad crossing the County Road. This one was a big ‘un an years before, having learned a painful lesson well, I gave Mr. Crawdad a wide berth.