It never gets old holding a nice Red in front of your buddy waiting on a Bite! Capt. Jeff Larson

Hallelujah! COOL WEATHER coming down the pipe! We have been having some smoking HOT weather and a ton of fire blazing fishing trips. Come on down and wet a line or melt your barrel.

Teal Season was pretty good compared to last year’s monsoon Teal Season. We shifted gears and drove to the Rice belt in East Bernard, Garwood, Eagle Lake areas. We had 1 super slow hunt followed by some good 1s coupled with some barrel melters. No Bird bands this year for us but I saw a few guides that were lucky enough to add to their call lanyard. Bird Banding Certificates are really cool to see the History and flight path they take from Canada.

Back in February, Captain Doug Berry and his Customer doubled up on pintail drake’s with bands. They had been banded in Canada and they shot them in Mexico. I forgot their age but it was cool to see how far they fly in a year. That’s some serious real estate.

We have steadily been smashing the trout, reds and black drum. Flounder are still being caught by waders using soft plastics. I talked to Captain Pat Lester today and he has several gigging trips lined up before he heads to his Northern Headquarters in North Dakota. He said the high tide has made it a little interesting because they are way up in the grass ambushing bait. The flounder are putting on weight and the per pound average is almost 2 pounds. No real saddle blankets yet but that will change after this next cold front.

We had a return visit from the Peppers who always enjoy Airboat Redfishing. They brought some friends down from Colorado who never even heard of a Redfish or Black Drum. It didn’t take the newbies long before they got the feel of the pecking Black Drum bite and the Slam take your rod down Redfish bite. We scratched out a couple limits of both and headed back to the dock before it got too hot.

Good News! Ducks and Geese are already showing up. Big ducks, not just Teal. We are seeing plenty of Pintails and Red Heads moving into the marsh. Couple more fronts before the opener will do the trick. Plus it will blow out some of this high tide. The Fall Equinox always means high tides and it takes several northers to get us back to normal.

I haven’t been deer hunting in several years nor have I heard any reports. Good Luck to yall Deer Hunters.

This is new for Duck Hunters! We will be Duck Hunting during the Split! Don’t get your feathers ruffled up. We will be down in Old Mexico just a few hundred miles down the coast. For the Duck Hunters that hunt Mansfield and south, you know how they raft up by the thousands. Well we will be staying on em just South of the Border. We can accommodate groups up to 6. 4 or 5 hunters is optimal for Airbooat Logistics. If we can get you in during the split. We will be back the day after our Duck Season closes and hunt through February.

If you want to Duck Hunt in Mexico while our Season is open, we can book you transportation from Harlingen to the Lodge in San Fernando. You will need a Passport.

The Saltwater Lodge is always available to plan your next Fishing or Hunting trip so give Billy a call for Lodge Accommodations at 713 907 4796.

Get out the long sleeve flannel shirts and Hoodies cause Jack Frost is on his way,

Captain Jeff Larson
281 217 0399

“Pre-Fall Gal”
Capt. Chris Martin

The brief cool fronts that we tend to get during this month will probably place the fishing in somewhat of a springtime pattern. This being the case, and in conjunction with the higher tides that we’ll continue seeing, coastal bend anglers in search of repeated success will be focusing a fair percentage of their efforts in locations situated deep within the back lakes region of Matagorda Island.

The back lakes have recently produced attractive trout and redfish catches, but searching for and locating active accumulations of baitfish will need to be your first priority. In looking for schools of mullet, try wading along shorelines that are made up of scattered grass beds. These grass beds often hold food sources for the mullet, and can also serve as a safe haven from predators, as well. Look for the trout to be located above these grassy patches in water that is clear and green. And look to find backcountry redfish to be schooled-up tight to the shoreline in some of the more murky water covering the grass and mud.

Anglers can begin their daily regimen in these secluded areas by tossing top water baits early, and then transition to plastic tails or slow-sinkers later in the morning. In selecting a top water bait to start your day, you may wish to pick one of the smaller ones, as these may more closely resemble small silver shad or mullet. Plus, small top water baits tend to make a lot less noise when casted upon the surface of calm waters that are so often found in the back lakes. A couple of top producers have been surface baits like the Super Spook Junior and the Skitter Walk Junior in some of the more brighter color patterns whenever fishing in clear, clean water on a bright sunny day, and some of the darker color patterns whenever fishing in off-colored water on an overcast day.

When it comes to plastics, one of the best tails to be tossing this month is sand eels, especially for redfish action. And, of course, favored slow-sinkers still include the entire line of the Corky baits – the original Corky, the Fat Boy, the Corky Devil, and even the MirrOdine lures. Anglers should also never discount the use of the old reliable gold and silver spoon this month, as spoons definitely have historical merit in times when things begin to cool-off a bit along the coast.

Remembering that the days will be getting shorter now and that there will be less hours of daylight with each passing day, anglers can generally begin transitioning to the presentation of dark-colored lures on a regular basis if they should prefer to do so. Darker lures tend to imitate a silhouette symbolic of natural bait, and the darker the silhouette will mean better reflection of the bait against the upward sunlight. Here’s to a great month for fishing! Keep grindin’!

It’s a great month to be in Port O’Connor.  The weather is starting to cool down a little, the redfish bite is excellent and the boat traffic on the bay is thinning out a little.  If that’s not enough to make you happy  October is also National Seafood Month.

Do yourself a favor and take the Smart Seafoodie Challenge (available at tx.ag/smartseafoodie): Commit to eating local seafood 2 times per week and if you don’t catch it yourself make sure you ask where your seafood comes from.  Check the label on the back.  The country of origin must legally be labeled on the back.  We are fortunate to have several local Seafood Markets in Calhoun County that can provide you with fresh local seafood right off the boat.  When you shop local you support your neighbors that live here and pay taxes here.

In 2017 Texas landed over 93 million pounds of seafood composed of over 50 different species.  If you would like to taste several of those species you are welcome to join me as the Texas A&M AgriLife Extension and Texas Sea Grant present: Dinner Tonight, Healthy Cooking School: Seafood Edition on Monday October 21, 2019 at 6:30pm at the Bauer Exhibit Building in Port Lavaca.  We will be eating local fish that the TPWD Coastal Fisheries Office in Port O’Connor donated to us.  These are fish that were collected as part of routine TPWD sampling and were not able to be returned to the water.  Yours truly has been filleting the donated fish.  So far we have mostly redfish, black drum and speckled trout.  There were also a few mangrove snapper, gafftop, croaker and a pompano.

You will learn several healthy and tasty ways to prepare these fish and while you are enjoying your dinner I will give you some information on what types of fish you are eating along with a few pointers on where they live and what type of bait to use to catch them.  Then I’ll show you how to fillet them in case you want to go get some of your own to try at home.  The program costs $10 per person before October 18th or $15 per person at the door.  To reserve your spot or for more information contact Karen Lyssy at (361) 552-9747 Ext. 5 or Karen.lyssy@ag.tamu.edu.  I hope to see you there.

Tight Lines,
RJ Shelly
Calhoun County Extension Agent-Coastal & Marine Resources
Texas Sea Grant College Program | Texas A&M Agrilife Extension

Our Fall Garage Sale is history! We want to first of all thank ALL the service club members and their spouses who worked so tirelessly since the last sale getting ready for this one. If you haven’t worked on one of these sales, just know that they take a LOT of hours of hard work in the weeks and months before each sale. And of course, a big thank you to those of you in the community who once again supported this effort, either through your donation of goods or through your purchases. The bake sale was a particular success this year – we even had non-members donate baked goods for us to sell, so a big thank you to all you bakers out there too!

One thing you might not know about the garage sale is everything that doesn’t sell has to be removed and disposal arranged. The Service Club has to arrange for an organization to pick up anything that is unsold and haul it off that same day. Sometimes we are able to find another non-profit willing to do that, but sometimes we have to pay to have items removed, which of course cuts into the profits made and reduces what we have to spend on community improvements. This is one of the reasons we have had to refuse certain items and continue to remind everyone goods need to be in reasonably decent condition!
Please mark your calendars now for the Spring sale to be held on April 4
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Other upcoming events:

New flagpole and U.S. flag at our front beach: We reported in the last issue that service club had designated funds for this project; Club is working with the County on installation and we are hoping to have the new flagpole and flag installed by the end of November
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Front Beach benches and picnic tables: The end of this year is also our target date for completing the replacement of front beach picnic tables and benches.

Senior Citizen’s Annual Christmas Luncheon: Remember to save the date: Friday, December 6 at 11 a.m. at the Port O’Connor Community Service Center!

Next Service Club meeting: Thursday, November 7 – 10 a.m. at the Community Center.

The Service Club meets twice monthly from September – May on the first and third Thursdays, and once a month June – August on the first Thursday; always at 10 a.m. at the Community Center (enter through the back door). All are welcome – members can be full or part-time POC residents and we’d love to have you join us. The Service Club is an all-volunteer, 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to supporting the Port O’Connor community by providing support and funds for programs and events for the betterment of this community. If you are looking for a way to give back to the Port O’Connor community, come join us!