Putting tasty fillets on the grill this month is as easy as making this circuit through the Hopedale marsh.
The water was off-colored, but Capt. Ben Leto wasn’t worried.
“I caught them in here yesterday as fast as we could get bait on the bottom,” he said.
His boat was positioned in the “Hole in the Wall” along the rocks marking the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet, with the bow toward the rocks.
“The fish get on that slope,” the owner of Louisiana Fishing Expeditions said. “You want to put your bait on that slope.”
The cut in the rocks (located at 29 degrees, 39.496 minutes North, 89 degrees, 21.827 minutes West using WGS 84 datum) holds fish pretty much all the time because it’s a natural funnel.
“There’s just so much bait coming through right here,” Leto said. “There’s always some current, and it doesn’t matter which way it’s moving — as long as it’s moving.”
He said May is a perfect time to be anchored in the gap, but Leto doesn’t just pick any spot.
“I like to anchor on the southern shore of the cut, near the corner of the MRGO,” he said. “There’s a spillage of rock on that corner, and when I pass over it, you can see the fish all over the top of the rocks.”
However, the jumble of rocks can make fishing them expensive in bait and tackle, so Leto moves back a little.
“If you get too close, you get a lot of snags, so I try to get close to it so I can fish the edge,” he said.
The combination of a rock weir, plenty of underwater structure and a steep slope dropping into 30-foot depths makes the cut a fishing paradise — especially when the shrimp move in.
“You can catch a lot of trout in here,” he said. “You can get on a trolling motor and catch them right on the rocks under a cork.”
But we were there for sturdier fare: Leto said redfish swarm the slope picking off baitfish.
Being an artificial-bait snob, I was casting a fake cocahoe on a jighead and bouncing it back to the boat while Leto worked on getting a couple of Carolina rigs baited up with fresh cracked crabs.
That, he insisted, is one of the critical factors in his day-in-day-out success.
“I always bring bait,” he explained. “I’ve seen them make all the difference in the world, when they’ve turned a bad day into a good one.
“Some days, there will be a lot of boats in here. They’ll be all around me, and the fish just want the crabs. I’ll be the only one catching fish because I’ve got those crabs.”
In fact, he said it’s possible to generate a feeding frenzy to increase the number of bites.
“If I have enough crabs, I’ll bust them up and throw them out,” Leto said. “You’ll see them coming up; you’ll see schools of reds eating them.”
Leto’s rig is fairly standard, with a 2/0 kahle hook tied to a 12- to 18-inch leader of 20-pound mono that’s attached in turn to a small barrel swivel.
He weights the rig with a simple egg sinker, with exact weight chosen dependent upon the conditions.
“If there’s a lot of current I go heavy, but I use the lightest weight I can get by with,” Leto said. “I just want to get it to the bottom.”
Where Leto’s Carolina rig diverges from many is that his main line is relatively light for battles with bull reds, and he uses medium-action spinning rigs.
“I use 12-pound mono,” he said. “I use light tackle so people can get the fight out of the fish. It’s just more fun.”
That means his customers have to set the drag properly to avoid breaking off on the hookset, but because the light line is paired with medium-action rods, it also makes for a lot more enjoyment.
As if to highlight that fact, Covington’s Chris Smith snapped a rod tip skyward, and began a five-minute battle with a 15-pound red.
However, the bites inside the cut were few and far between, so Leto finally called for lines to be pulled in for a short move into the Ship Channel.
The goal was to target the same corner of the gap, but from a different angle.
“The fish will stack up over there, as well,” Leto said.
This is when he generally puts up the Carolina rigs and moves to ¼- to 3/8-ounce jigheads tipped with shrimp or crabs. Again, he uses the lightest weight possible.
“There are a lot of snags over there,” Leto said. “You don’t want to get too close to the (visible) rocks or you’ll get hung up.”
Within minutes of repositioning, Leto and Covington angler Bobby Bunol were dancing around the boat in an attempt to keep two MRGO bulls from tangling their lines.
After several more big reds were netted and released, it was time to head to the marshes to look for fish in shallower haunts.
Leto said he frequently heads east of the MRGO during the spring and early summer because there’s often a lot of fresh, muddy water west of the ship channel.
“When they open up the (diversion), I’ll run away from that fresh water,” he explained. “I’ll run to the Biloxi Marsh or to Bay Eloi and Breton Sound to get away from the river water in Black Bay.”
Although the options are limitless, Leto said there are some high-percentage areas on which he focuses.
Of course, the many reefs in Bay Eloi can be extremely productive for reds and trout.
Leto said reefs all along the southern edges of the Hopedale and Biloxi marshes have become more and more important to his fishing.
“I watch my depth finder while I’m running, and if I see the bottom go from 5 or 6 feet up to 3 feet, I mark it,” he said. “A lot of the reefs used to be islands. Those islands are gone now, but they’re still there under the water and they’re solid shell.”
He said finding such reefs can mean quick limits of reds and specks.
“You get away from the crowds,” Leto explained. “Most people don’t know where the reefs are, and won’t take the time to learn.”
While he was reluctant to give up his underwater gold mines, Leto agreed to share some of the extremely productive banks along which reds will prowl as the summer heats up.
Lake Athanasio is one of his first stops, with the eastern shore being particularly productive.
“There’s nothing special about it,” he said. “You just drift the bank.”
But when he’s serious about interior fishing, Leto heads deep into the Biloxi Marsh and works areas that regularly provide plenty of action.
He begins by running up Bayou La Loutre to Stump Lagoon, through which he runs to get to Muscle Bay.
“All of the banks around Muscle Bay stack up with reds,” he said.
If Leto’s still looking to fill his limit, he heads east through Crooked Bayou to Lake Eugenie and works the banks all around it. Here, some of the islands have eroded and provide great shell reefs that attract fish.
As he heads for home, he makes stops in Flat Bay and Drum Lake.
“It’s just a big circle you can make,” Leto said.
When working these marshes, a falling tide is best, he said.
“That pulls all the bait out of the marsh,” Leto explained. “The reds will be stacked on all the cuts and trenasses, and that makes them easy to target.”
He also likes to find areas that hold submerged grass.
“The fish will be up in that grass, and you can often see them tailing,” Leto said.
If the diversion isn’t flowing enough to affect the Hopedale marshes, Leto said there are several options on that side of the MRGO.
Lakes Machias, Calebasse and Robin, along with Lake of Two Trees, are all prime examples, allowing Leto to fish a relatively confined area while providing plenty of options so he can adjust to find fish.
“You just have to always be observant of the conditions around you,” Leto said. “I’m always watching and trying to think about why somewhere holds fish: If you were a baitfish, where would you be and if you were a big fish, where would you be?”
He said wind direction can make a difference in how he fishes these large lakes on the edges of the marsh.
“When you’ve got a strong east wind, I’m fishing the east side, and if the wind’s out of the west, I’m on the west side,” Leto said.
He added that reefs aren’t as important here as they were before Hurricane Katrina, however.
“A lot of the oysters in these lakes were actually pushed onto the islands, and a lot of the ones that weren’t were covered with mud,” Leto said. “I’m having to find new reefs.”
As to how he catches reds in all of these marsh situations, Leto relies pretty much on one lure — the Norton Brass Rattler.
This weedless spoon includes a brass rattle chamber that gives it a hefty weight while sending out a clatter that attracts reds’ attention.
“You can cast it a mile,” Leto said. “But as heavy as it feels, you can fish it real slow.”
In fact, Leto fishes it a lot like a he would a jig, popping it back to the boat instead of using a steady retrieve.
“I like to fish it real slow,” he said. “Sometimes I just pick it up off the bottom and let it flutter down.”
The lure’s design makes this possible, inventor Don Norton explained.
“It doesn’t spin,” the Jackson, Miss., angler said. “It just rocks back and forth.”
That lack of spin combines with a sturdy stainless-steel weedguard to make the Brass Rattler perfect for getting bites from fish buried in grass in marsh ponds.
“I like to find where they’re working that grass, and throw that spoon right up into the grass,” he said. “They’ll explode on it.”
Fishing the spoon as slowly as Leto does means the bites can be somewhat subtle, however.
“Sometimes it’s just a tap,” he said. “Sometimes, they’ll pick it up and just sit on it.”
Another innovative aspect of the lure, which was tested and perfected in the marshes surrounding Hopedale, is that the angler can control the amount of wobble.
“You can leave the weedguard open, and it changes the wobble,” Norton said. “If it’s open, it gives the lure a slower, wider wobble.
“If you want a tight wobble or are fishing in tight cover, you can leave the weedguard on the hook, and it’ll give it a tight wobble. Sometimes that little change in wobble makes a big difference.”
Norton said reflective tape around the sound chamber, standard on all but the gold spoons, rounds out the package.
“It creates some flash,” he said. “I think a redfish is like a monkey: If it sees something flashing, it’s got to come investigate.”
The lure comes in dozens of color combinations, although Leto said he basically uses gold and black/green versions.
“I usually use the gold, but that darker color can really produce sometimes,” he said.
The lures are carried in New Orleans-area tackle shops. Norton said anglers can call his company (800-890-5113) to locate a dealer, or order lures off the Web (nortonbrassrattler.com).
Capt. Ben Leto can be reached at (985) 630-2066.
