Calcasieu Fishing This weekend!! Guidance

[Jedi Lure Tricks]

Originally Posted by ckinchen

I think you are going to want less weight for your sinker if you are going to catch trout. If you fish under a cork like a Cajun Thunder which is already weighted, maybe a small split shot is all you want on your leader line under your cork. When I fish carolina rig, unless I am in the gulf where there is a ton of current, I am usually using a 1/4 once sinker. If you are on a reef with clean water (see the previous post about west wind), live shirmp under a cork is hard to not catch fish. These guys will give you a hard time about using bait but don't worry about that for now. Learn the fishery first and you can "upgrade" to other bait later.

Solid advice there, Casey. But, I never worry at all what other people think about what kind of bait I use! Who cares?? They sure as heck ain't buyin your bait! It's your time on the water, use what you like!

Live bait is king in most places and will almost always outfish artificial plastic baits, whether some people admit it or not, that's the truth. If you want to catch em and put meat in the freezer with consistency, throw live bait. If you want to try and trick em and maybe catch, maybe not, toss plastics.

I'm reminded of a phrase that was told to me when I was a kid, fishing for snook in Florida, by an old salty dog in a local tackle shop. He said "match the hatch, son." Meaning, throw something closely resembling what the fish's main forage is. What matches the hatch closer than live bait?? Nothing! And lets not forget that almost all artificial plastic lures are designed to imitate some form of live bait!

If you come down Sulphur way, come on by the Tackle Box and ask for me. I'll be more than happy to show you some spots on the map, help ya get rigged up right and get ya the info you need to be more successful at catchin fish, that's my job! My favorite part of my job is helping people and giving useful info to help them get fish in the boat!