The Lake Pontchartrain Trestles isn’t the only place Capt. John Falterman fishes in June for speckled trout. On calm days, he likes to run out to some of the near-shore rigs, particularly if he’s struggling at the Trestles that day.
“The Lake Borgne rigs are really hot in June,” he said. “Those shells concentrate the fish.”
Anywhere along the coast, speckled trout love holding on oyster reefs and hard bottoms, and areas in Lake Borgne are no exception.
“The shrimp can’t bury themselves on the shell pads,” Falterman said. “Usually, those fish are sitting up against those shell pads, and they’re ambushing the bait.”
Electronics are invaluable in deep-water fisheries, like Lake Pontchartrain and surrounding areas. Locating the shell pads — which is a must if you want to catch fish at the Lake Borgne structures — is a whole lot easier with a quality depth finder.
In fact, Falterman believes in them so much that he has nearly $7,000 worth of electronics on his boat.
“A (fish finder) takes a little bit of the guess work out of it,” he said. “Learn your electronics, and if you’re going to use them, use them to your advantage.”
The specific fish finder Falterman has on his boat is a Humminbird Onix 10, with both side-imaging and down-imaging.
Besides fishing Lake Borgne, Falterman recommends anglers explore the whole Pontchartrain fishery to locate fish.
“Find the cleanest water you can from (the Trestles) to the Biloxi Marsh,” he advised. “You can get away from the boats, but it’s a matter of getting a mind set you may have to bounce around and burn a bit of fuel to get on them.”
