[Devin]

I don’t see any reason why you can’t begin looking that far inside for trout. It’s mid-October.

Of course, I’m always interested in what @malice has to say, but I think you can find something down there.

When you fished Port Sulphur before, how did you do in October?

[Devin]

I was definitely asleep at 9:23pm, as I am sure other members were, but I am glad you made this post anyway.

Sounds about like the same conditions over there as over here. I think Sunday will be your day, but who knows what could drain out of the marsh this morning.

I don’t know how much storm surge you got, but I do know the shrimp boats over here were and are rolling out to get all the storm surge dropping out, or at least what’s left.

Most of it dropped out last night. Some more still to go, but not much.

[Devin]

That’s awesome. Man, I hate electrical gremlins.

Glad you got it fixed and thank you for sharing the update with us.

[Devin]

Also, FWIW, I see that you have the Shell Beach tide table attached to your planning post.

The areas I mentioned are closer to Comfort Island and Grand Pass tide tables, as they are further east and away from Lake Borgne.

So, water at the mouth of Crooked Bayou dumping into Lake Eugene will move first way before the tide at Doulut’s Canal does, for example.

[Devin]

Hey James, thanks for introducing yourself and welcome to the Community, even though you’ve been here a minute.

I like your Option 1 way better than I do Option 2.

It’s October. I wouldn’t dream of fishing Christmas Camp, etc.

I’m assuming you’re targeting a limit of speckled trout, I would be looking for them from the Lakes of Bayou Marron to the eastern Lake Borgne shoreline. I would definitely concentrate on that area: Muscle Bay, Crooked Bayou, Bayou Biloxi, Lake Eugene, Lakes of Bayou Marron, etc.

I def saw shrimp and diving birds out there about a month ago, but all I caught were mostly smalls. That could have changed by now.

Your boat will have no problem crossing Lake Borgne, as I’m sure you know.

[Devin]

@ShooterMcGrabbin started a petition to have the Mattes fish struck from the record.

It’s a travesty that there’s only 100+ signatures on it.

You guys should sign it if you have not already.

Find the petition here.

[Devin]

@mschultz304 where do you trailer from?

I’m curious if there are places closer to you than Port Sulphur.

Saturday all that water piled up on the east side of the river ought to be dropping out. It could be really good.

[Devin]

How did I not see this?!! I must be blind!!!

Well, thank you.

I got a storage unit already, but this one is much better.

I will hit them up on Monday to see their cost, if they have availability, etc. I imagine there’s a waiting list since they haven’t updated their Facebook in awhile.

Thank you!

[Devin]

Ah, someone looking at older reports. Very good. Makes me happy.

[Devin]

Water temp is too high.

Looking back at my previous reports, the water temp was in the mid to high 70s when Martello and Thomas were really rocking.

I do have one report from September 15th, 2018 where I caught them pretty good at Martello when the water temp on my transducer was 86-88 degrees.

Shell Beach buoy reported something similar.

Caught 52 trout by myself between Martello and Biloxi Marsh. Mostly at Martello on the last half of that falling tide.

But every year is different. It does sound like trout found a lot of white shrimp on the outside, as indicated by our Long Rocks/diving birds reports that have come in from @JonFisher and @Geremy IIRC.

I’d say that 2018 trip was exceptional.

The rest of my reports indicate that mid to high 70s water temp.

I also think a lot of the trout that were in the Sounds all summer have moved down toward the River, because I know they’re catching them there.

Just follow Brandon Carter on Facebook. He’s our “canary in the coal mine” for Venice speckled trout. lol

[Devin]

Okay, I see. Thank you for clarifying.

[Devin]

Shoot, it’ll be a great trout and redfish day!!

[Devin]

Also, very cool that you’re rocking a SHO.

I bet that boat screams!

[Devin]

Okay cool, good report.

I’m interested to know more about your battery setup.

Since you have a 22′ boat, I am assuming that’s a 36 volt trolling motor on it?

And you have a T-top on it? (I ask because a T-top would create more drag and make the TM work harder)

If that is a 36 volt trolling motor, I would strongly consider investing in a fourth battery strictly for cranking and house accessories (GPS, bilge, etc.)

Then wiring all these on a battery switch so that you can use one of your trolling motor batteries in parallel with your cranking battery to “jump” the motor in case batteries are going out.

Four year old lead-acid batteries aren’t too old, but they’re not young, either. I would ensure that their cells are topped off.

Running three batteries for a trolling motor and using one for crank/house is risky. I wouldn’t dream of that, as that would only appear in my nightmares.

It would also put a lot of strain on that one battery that’s doing the extra work as TM/crank/house.

A 36v setup shared with house/crank is something you can get by with fishing close to the dock, but imagine if you were at SouthWest Pass. You’d be cooked.

You want your boat to be bulletproof so you know it’s gonna perform and you can just enjoy fishing.

So, four batteries, 3 for TM, 1 for crank/house and a battery jumper as a backup anyway.

Icing on the cake is installing a switch to configure one TM for jumping the crank/house battery.

And a battery switch is nice just to ensure that there’s no parasitic voltage drain (or whatever its called) while your boat is sitting out.

Picture below of my battery switch so you can see what I’m talking about.

Some Lagniappe:

A “gucci” and far more reliable setup when running extra electronics, VHF, sonar, etc. is a battery dedicated to those items.

So that’s a fifth battery. But I think you’re probably running one graph, one transducer, so that’s not a need.

Since your boat is aluminum, you can probably get away with lithium batteries if you ever want to consider replacing the batteries you currently have, which I assume are lead-acid.

A single 36v LiPo battery for the trolling motor, then a 12v battery for crank/house.

That will free up a lot of room by your transom and maybe the boat will ride better.

My boat is fiberglass (and lots of it), and I’ve read that owners who put LiPo batteries in their Comanches found that it doesn’t ride as well because that hull likes more weight toward the back.

I’ve also read about guys literally putting kettlebells back there to add weight to accommodate the LiPo batteries.

Also, if/when you run your wires, run your TM wires down one side of the boat (usually port), and electronics wires (everything else) down the starboard side.

EMI from the high amperage of your TM can cause interference on your more sensitive electronics.

[Devin]

Great question.

I have. In the River, Central Rig, Seabrook and other deep passes.

Specifically, a 3/4oz or 1oz jighead on 12lb mono and FC.

And you’re right, that line is more surface area for fast current to push against.

So, I think that you reach a point of diminishing returns with the jig the deeper/faster you go.

I’m not saying it’s impossible, I’m not even saying it’s a bad technique because I’ve caught a lot of nice speckled trout doing it.

Jigging really shines at places like the Trestles. It’s still relevant in the deeper/faster places.

But I think those deeper/faster places is where the Heavy Drop Shot does better.

And I have HDS rigged up on 20-30lb braid. I do have one that I alternate between an actual drop shot and HDS with 10lb braid.

The difference between it and 12-15lb mono in that deeper/faster water is noticeable. There just isn’t as bow in the line.

For comparison, there was a tournament KVD won by bomb casting a jerkbait on braid. IIRC, the reason he was using braid is because so much line was out that he was getting bad hooksets using FC or mono.

Or something like that, I don’t recall the specifics. I just remember the lesson of using braid to get good hooksets on legit bomb-casts.

It’s worth noting that most inshore anglers do not cast as far as they think they do. Start measuring the actual cast and that yardage shrinks pretty quick.

And it’s worth noting that bass have much wider/harder mouths than trout. Those hooksets are everything.

In inshore fishing, we really only need to sweep the rod. But do that flipping and you’re gonna miss fish all day.