It is also a kid friendly place

Just a suggestion, try Goose Island State Park. Great pier, wading access, open flats, and a self serve kayak rental kiosk if you’d like to try it. $5 entry per person for day/night visits. RV and campgrounds by reservation. Boat ramp in the park. Fishing advice, if stationary on the pier, shore, or sea wall, try some healthy sized chunks of cut mullet, sea lice, or crab for the drum and reds. Live shrimp or mullet under a popping cork if you’re equipped for live. Soft plastics under a cork or mauler rig, wading, drifting or stationary, or your favorite spoons, tops, hard baits

1. You can’t catch them in the driveway
2. The more days you fish, the more great days you’ll have fishing.

1989 Kenai River Alaska. After a few great days fishing and roughing it, we had to return to Anchorage. My brother in law had to go back to work, but I had day left before the big bird back to Texas. I drove to a roadside rest stop and made a short walk through the forest to the riverbank. So many red salmon on light tackle I took breaks to rest, eat, drink and enjoy the day. Within the first hour, 3 keepers made it back up the trail into the truck and ice chest. I fished for hours and easily lost track of time. The long daylight helped, but the action was non stop and I knew I may never do this again. As I rested on the bank, I realized the road traffic noise had almost disappeared and decided my best day fishing was about to end. No fishing partner, only a couple of drift boats to wave at, no one to share the day with. But first, just a few more casts. As I released another salmon, I heard the snaps and rustling in the forest above. I had seen only one pair of deer earlier but no bears all week. I looked up the bank, and saw nothing. My mind wandered with bears in my brain, but one more cast. I heard the snap and crackle one more time, but decided to die happy. Hooked up, monster run and jump, shook the hook. When the voice behind me said, “hello, that’s too bad”, I about crapped my pants. The federal game warden looked like Doogie Howser, a rookie on his first assignment out of Podunk, Ohio. I was still young enough to get pissed off, and enlightened the young warden about etiquette in the most impolite way. Now that I’m old and retired, a return to Kenai is on my bucket list.

Welcome, in Corpus Christi and the Coastal Bend Community are fishing opportunities for all. Enjoy, keep in touch if you ever need any tips or advice

Jer is correct, they will float. I learned that working them under a popping cork on the flats. So using a Texas or shorter leader Carolina rigs may get you what you need over grass beds. I’ll do the short slip rig down here too. I especially like their durability

Ditto to all of the above, unfortunately we’ve all heard or seen them too many times. Personal worst: wading about 50 yds from the shoreline when a boat load runs between us and the shore. At least they waved at us

Ditto to all of the above, unfortunately we’ve all heard or seen them too many times. Personal worst: wading about 50 yds from the shoreline when a boat load runs between us and the shore. At least they waved at us

They are fun to fight and photograph. My theory is big baits and less weight. Like CamT said, targeting the big reds is often done in late fall and early winter near gulf access, jetties and passes. But even then, it’s like real estate, right place, right time. That action can be fast and furious for a few hours and then nothing. My advice when wading/fishing flats is work areas with nearby access to depth changes like channels, canals, guts and even as obvious as the Intercoastal Waterway. Secondly, look for any type of nearby structure, grass lines, oyster beds, pylons, rocks, duck blinds, crab traps, etc… Upsize your baits, lose the the heavy rigs and use a slip rig. Everything will eat a shrimp and a small piece of bait and those bandits are everywhere, your big reds may never have the time to find your offering. Try slabs of mullet or skipjack as big as an egg or baseball on at least a 5/0 hook. Those are my favorites, but large cut baits of any species will also work. Palm sized bait crabs and sea lice are also used by many. The odor of a big cut bait
will be better and the bait bandits won’t be able destroy it in 10 seconds. Of course you can rig the same way with live swimmers like mullet, pin fish, or mud minnows, but I’m decent with a cast net and don’t like paying for them or worrying about keeping them alive. I like setting with a bait alarm reel or bait runner reel, cast and wait. Let the bait soak,

We love to find some drum. And yes, the immature drum will have stripes and as they grow the stripes will fade. The bull drum, we like to call the “Big Uglies”, will vary in color and appearance. Like yours, they can be very light, sometimes grey, and can even have golden tints. They will grow vertically and appear to have a “humpback”. Fall and early cold fronts can cause migration patterns and movements off the shallow flats, “Drum Runs” and can be fun. A little uncomfortable for fishermen and women, but not the fish. The “worm problem” is not uncommon, even in the keeper slot size fish, and other species. Big drum are fun to fight, but after a quick photo, release them to make more for the future. 30” is the top of the keeper slot. The good news down here is nice schools of keeper drum can be found year round. Have fun!

Nice, but not a redfish. It’s a black drum.

Nice catch. That’s the cousin, black drum.

Nice catch. That’s the cousin, black drum.

Looks really good now, but it can change rapidly.

Try cctexas.com/gulf-beaches-webcams

The camera at Whitecap in nearest to the Bob Hall site