A New Iberia angler eventually found his heaven on earth for catching speckled trout and redfish 35 years years ago. And he’s still finding happiness there.
Kevin Suit still goes to the Dulac area on weekends and days off every November and December. His hotspot is 2 ½ to 3 hours away, depending on if he stops along U.S. 90 East to stock up on fresh shrimp and breakfast biscuits at Dago’s Mobil and Grocery in Lydia.
Prime areas
It took Suit and his close friend Tim Markle of New Iberia six or seven hours to find the prime areas the first time they went in 1987.
They relied on a Louisiana Sportsman article that year, but unlike today, had no GPS or cell phone instructions for the trip southeast of Iberia Parish. After making their way to Four Point Landing along the Houma Navigation Canal at Dulac it took them a few hours by boat to get to what have become Suit’s go-to “honey holes” around Bay Antoine, Bayou Sale and Marrone Bay.
“We’ve been on countless, countless trips down there and caught countless numbers of speckled trout and redfish”, Suit said, warming up to his favorite subject besides bass fishing.
“There are bad days, but even the bad days are good,” Suit said in late October, a few weeks after clinching Angler of the Year in the Louisiana Bass Cats.
When Suit’s two sons, Ben and Zach, were old enough, they joined him on the many trips to the honey holes. They know the area as well as he does now.
He has taken many anglers as guests, including a local outdoors writer and his son.
“I do enjoy going down there,” he said. “It a relaxing-type fishing trip. We catch a lot of fish and it’s fun.”
While the best time to fish it is the week before or the week after Thanksgiving, he said, December “is a good month.”
“December’s usually harder on the fishermen with cold mornings and nice days,” he said. “It gets cold. But fishing’s still good.”
After the front
The 63-year-old said speckled trout bite best after the first hard cold front and until the water temperature drops into the 50s. Redfish, he said, seem to bite all the time.
After this year, if new speckled trout regulations become law, it may take a little longer to get a limit of 13 ½-inch-plus speckled trout but they can be had. He knows from experience. To be safe, he said, they’ll probably just keep speckled trout over 14 inches. Most of the speckled trout are in the 11- to 13-inch range, he said.
His top speckled trout bait is a VuDu Shrimp fished 1 ½- to 3-feet under a popping cork over oyster beds. Speckled trout seem to favor the natural colored VuDu Shrimp.
If they aren’t biting under the popping cork, his sons favor fishing a Lemonhead, Shrimp Creole or Green Hornet colored Matrix Shad on a jighead. Avocado/red flake also works well.
Speckled trout will be under the birds, in front of drains or in the middle of the canal.
The Suits catch beaucoup redfish on VuDu Shrimp, too. Mostly, though, the main meal ticket is a fresh shrimp on a leadhead, which the boys use. But Suit prefers a Matrix Shad on a 3/8- or ¼-ounce jighead tipped with shrimp.
They’ve enjoyed hooking up with and landing triples — three at a time — many times.
And they’ll keep going back for more this November and December. It’s a good time for you to give it a try, too.
