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Captain Mark guides
out of Golden Isles Marina on St Simons
Island, Georgia. He's a
great guy and even better guide and I had
the pleasure of fishing with him again
recently. We were looking for redfish
in the creeks and tidal marshes of the
Georgia coastal estuary.
Like most redfish anglers, I
had been taught and have practiced
all my life looking for redfish on a
high, outgoing tide.
Several logical reasons make me do
that.
First, the creeks I chose to
fish were all navigable at high tide,
making access safe and
easy.
Second, reds will find the marsh and
mud flats that are flooded on high
tide and they will move there to
feed. It
was obvious to me that as the water
dropped on an outgoing tide, these
reds would have to come off the flats
and into the creeks with the
tide. We
would always be there waiting for
them to move through.
Here is where the difference
was in what I grew up doing and what
Captain Mark taught me. On
this trip, we fished the dead low and
incoming tide.
I was convinced as we
entered the first creek that we would
be waiting for the next five or six
hours for high tide. But
as the current began to move, Captain
Mark took one of his famous "Thunder
Chicken" float rigs baited with a
live shrimp, and allowed it to drift
away from the boat with the
increasing current.
Not only did that shrimp get
eaten, but every shrimp we put into
that drift was taken by some very
aggressive redfish.
Needless to say, I was
amazed that these fish would be here
on an incoming tide. I
was amazed until Captain Mark made me
think about what was
happening.
"The fish you look for on a
high outgoing tide have been feeding
on that flat for an hour or more," he
said.
"The fish we are catching here
probably have not fed in several
hours, and they are headed into the
creek to move onto those
flats.
Which fish do you think will be more
likely to take your bait -- one that
has already been feeding, or one that
is hungry and looking for
food?"
I had no answer for him --
just a look that said that light
bulbs were turning on in my
head.
What he said make perfect
sense. And
for the next two hours, that perfect
sense played out with a limit of
redfish in the boat and many more
than that released.
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As the
current increased, I
caught even more
reds.
At one point, it was
five casts and five
reds.
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As I drove home from that
trip, I began to think about the creek
we had fished, and I realized that the
exact creek was not
important. Any
and all creeks that flood out onto a
marsh or mudflat will contain fish at
some point.
I did my field homework the
next week, and went into the Florida
Intracoastal Waterway to a number of
my favorite creeks that meander off
the waterway. This
time I purposely went on a low tide,
and I found one or two of my creeks
that I could navigate at low
tide.
I eased my boat in, shut the
engine off and slowly poled back into
the first creek to the first
bend. I
quietly pushed the pole into the mud
bank, tied off the boat and waited
for things to settle.
As
soon as the water started moving in,
I took a plastic grub and
jig -- chartreuse in
color -- and began to slowly work
the opposite, deeper
bank. It
took only three casts to hook up with
a nice red.
As the current increased, I
caught even more reds. At
one point, it was five casts and five
reds. I
also caught some small seatrout and
two sheepshead, and catching
sheepshead on artificial bait is
saying something in my
world!
So I think all this points
out a good lesson. What
we did with Captain Mark is not a
Georgia story and it is not limited
to redfish. It
is applicable in every area that has
tidal marshes and any fish that feed
on these marshes and flats on a high
tide. The
key becomes locating tidal creeks
that are navigable, at least at an
idle speed or with the assistance of
a pole, at low tide.
Low tide, a quiet boat,
incoming current, and a good creek
all come together to make for some
fine redfish action - and the other
fish are a bonus that will add to
your day!
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