Time and tide wait for no man

[wishin i was fishin]

So, while on the water this Saturday I had a Revelation regarding tides. the plan was to run through Bird Island Bayou to West oyster bayou for some scouting. I should also mention this can be a dangerous run if you are not EXTREMELY familiar with the area. it gets real shallow on the other side of oyster lake. I had checked the tide before I left (mound point station) and it looked like high tide early afternoon. Well we were in oyster lake contemplating the run but the tide was still falling. Even double checked the tide again. Soo, started to head back to the mouth of bird island bayou and finished the day.

Well, the Revelation came when when I looked at my sonar data from the trip. I noticed that the bayou was deep at the mouth and got real shallow after oyster lake. Once you get past the shallow part in West Oyster bayou it gets deep again. So...Bird Island Bayou tides reflect data form the cyp point station and the West Oyster Bayou tide reflects that of the Mound Point station. Looking around the island I noticed the same structure of canals in the worm and bayou blanc for example. So studying the rest of the canals I noticed I was looking at the wrong tide stations, and wondering why the tides were never correct.

There are always questions about the tides so hope this helps break it down a bit and help choose the correct tide station for the area you want to fish. Since we have so many tide stations to choose from. Below is a GE shot showing which canals are affected by which stations.

Now there are still the external factors that affect the tide like wind.

[Stumpy14]

That's some great information I have the same problem when looking for tidal info. I fish oyster lake and it never cross my mind about mound point! I was using the one for southwest pass.


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[MarshRat89]

Awesome you will do well this summer with all the data you have collected plus the data we plan to collect outside.


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[wishin i was fishin]

Correct Marshrat, it is amazing what i have learned since mapping with reefmaster and i only have a little bit of data. by summer i will have quite a bit and make my trips more effective.