Season-high salinity levels in Black Bay have specks turned on
Recent rains and a persistent, light easterly wind could mean good news for anglers looking for speckled trout in Black Bay this weekend, according to Ron “Capt. Ahab” Broadus.
“If the weather stays like it was today, with 3- to 5-mph winds out of the east with a strong incoming tide, the water in Black Bay has finally got some salt in it,” Broadus said. “The salinity levels are the highest they’ve been all summer, and the trout were on fire. They were hungry, hungry, hungry.”
On Tuesday, Ahab used both live shrimp and Deadly Dudley’s opening night with a chartreuse tail effectively. If you’re planning a trip this weekend, the operator of Capt. Ahab Charters had a few suggestions.
“I would hit all the favorite spots in Black Bay like Bell Island, Stone Island and The Wreck,” he said. “If the weather’s too rough this weekend, I’d fish inside for redfish, and either use live bait or dead shrimp under a cork on some points and along some grassy shorelines.
“The water the last few days has been high, so it’s run some of the reds up in the marsh and way up in the grass. If you’ve got a shallow boat and some weedless spoons and spinnerbaits, then you could probably have a ball this weekend with redfish.”
He named Lake Lery, Little Lake, Lake Batola and the back of Skippy Lake as potential redfish hotspots.
Last month, high water temperatures and low salinity levels negatively impacted specks in Black Bay.
“The trout almost disappeared from Black Bay about a month ago. The month of June, most of us were just concentrating on redfish inside,” Broadus said. “It was driving the trout deep. Everybody was having to fish with sliding corks to find out how deep they were. Some guys were having to fish 6 or 7 feet down.”
The good news now is that the water is cooler, and a favorable east wind has helped increase salinity levels. If the weather conditions hold, the weekend could be promising, he said.
“The water temperature is in the low 80s now, compared to the high 80s last weekend,” Ahab said. “The rain this last week has cooled the water off, the river is going down and the salinity levels with these strong east winds are back up in Black Bay.”
