Every year at this time, specks and reds get the itch to slam jerkbaits.
Snapper season got off to a great start this past weekend. According to Capt. Chris Moran with Cajun Made Charters (225-931-7306), snapper were almost jumping in the boat.
“Every boat that went out came back with a limit on Saturday and Sunday,” he said.
Moran and his crews were fishing the Grand Isle and South Timbalier blocks anywhere from 10 to 30 miles out. Most were targeting rigs and wrecks, and it didn’t seem to matter just exactly where they fished.
“There are more snapper out there than I’ve seen in a while,” Moran said. “We had three boats leave at 6:30 only to come back in at 10:00 with limits. Everybody said the snapper were biting just as fast as they could get some bait down to them.”
The “bait du jour” for the weekend was dead sardines, pogies and thread herring. All were fished from 60 to 150 feet deep, and it wasn’t just the snapper that were biting these frozen treats.
“We had one boat that had to leave the rigs just to get off the amberjack,” Moran said. “Everybody had amberjack last weekend. That one boat got their limit of amberjack and had to leave because that’s all they kept catching. The amberjack were eating whatever we were dropping down for the snapper.”
Beside snapper and amberjack, Moran also reported that lemonfish were just everywhere. They were cruising on top and came up to the boats while anglers were fighting snapper. All it took to catch them was quickly dropping a piece of bait right on front of them. They would just pick it up and run off with it.
“Saying that it’s phenomenal is something considering what we’ve had lately,” Moran explained. “The bite was as easy as it’s been in a long time. There were a lot of recreational anglers out last weekend, and they were catching them too. Opening weekend was impressive by any standards despite the windy conditions. A lot of people braved the wind, and a lot of people caught fish.”
