Talking to Captain Cade Thomas with Run Away Charters (985-515-0687) the other day, I was trying to think of an excuse to not make the 2 1/2-hour drive from my house to Venice. He told me he was catching a ton of reds and a few specks – yawn. Then he told me he had caught 30 flounder that day. I was in Venice the next morning.After winding our way through Zin Zin Bay, we reached the maze of canals and bayous near the first spillway of Southwest Pass. The water was moving pretty strong, and we began tossing 1/2-ounce jigheads with black/chartreuse and purple/chartreuse Bayou Chubs tipped with fresh dead shrimp.
It wasn’t long before Thomas was pulling in a chunky flatfish over the gunwale of his Skeeter Bay Boat. Shaking and slipping the way only flounder can, the fish gave Thomas fits as he tried to take it off the hook and toss it on ice.
“Not a giant,” he said, “but a good fish nonetheless. They weren’t all huge yesterday, but we did manage a 3-pounder or two. Hopefully, we can get on a few of those today.”
We were throwing our baits on top of a flat that had deep water just a short cast out the other side of the boat. Thomas said the flounder were stacked up in deep water, and they would move up on the flat to feed every now and then. If we had our baits there when they moved up, we could catch all we wanted.
That was obvious as we began catching flounder after flounder in the next hour or two. A few were around 3 pounds, but most were closer to 2. Thomas, two of his buddies from Franklinton and I were sitting on an ice chest holding 40 flounder before the sun could get high enough to do its damage.
With that kind of action, I had to call the wife to let her know I was going to stick around another day, and boy, was I glad I did. We hit the same area the next morning and found the flounder just as ravenous.
While the other three were tossing their baits to the deep water out of the port side of the boat, I was fishing out the other side and hooked up with a 5-pound doormat. Thankfully, I had entered the $10 big-flounder side pot … ca-ching!
There are plenty flounder around Southwest Pass right now. Fish the points of drains that have deeper water off the corners. Eight to ten feet was the right depth just the other day, and that should continue to be a productive depth. Also, try fishing the points where bayous and canals intersect with the same depth.
Hit these areas with a jig tipped with a fresh dead shrimp for a little scent enticement, and you’ll find out why it’s worth dropping everything to head to Venice for some fast flatfish action.
