This has been a difficult year, especially for speckled trout in the Pontchartrain Basin. The good news is that the Bonnet Carré Spillway is finally completely shut and things should be on the up and up.
Don’t look for trout to magically pop back up in the lake, but this is one fine month to sight-fish for reds. Finding grassy ponds and crystal clear water is the key. The cleaner the ponds the better, usually. Too much grass can cause a problem but the perfect amount sets up a great estuary for fat slot reds riding high ready to crush Matrix Craws from MatrixShad.com, as seen in this video.
Ponds from Delacroix across to the Biloxi Marsh all the way back to the ICW hold beautiful golden reds this time of year. Bright neon grass seems to filter the cleanest water, and remember seeing stingrays is almost as important as seeing redfish.
I usually cruise around the ponds with the trolling motor on high speed until I start seeing a few stingrays or, of course, redfish.
Another thing reds will do is school up in the ponds filling in entire coves of pure gold. A lot of people are trout-only anglers even if it means long boat rides, early starts and expensive live bait, but that’s most of the time because they simply have never sight-fished reds. Watch this Dockside TV episode and get your blood pumping.
