By Capt. Raymond Griffin

Brrrrrrrrrrrrrr! It’s cold out there! I hope everyone had a great deer and duck season, but now it’s time to start getting ready for spring time red fishing. Aint it a great life here in the south! The best hunting, the best fishing or “catching” as we like to say and it’s all close to home. Just hours away in any direction we have what people all over country dream of! Sometimes we forget just how lucky we are.
So here we go. Lets start with when it’s time to get started. Good question, right? Well it’s not as easy as you think. You see, we are catchin red fish right now, lots of them. It’s just too darn cold to really enjoy it though.

This time of year the red fish are still close to the bottom to keep warm. Here’s the key. As the water temps rise to around 68 to 70 it triggers those fish to start moving out of their deep hole and start feeding again. Feeding is the next important factor. Those fish have been laying on or near the bottom for months now and not moving around much. They are HUNGRY! Have you ever noticed that early season red fish have leeches on their bellies? Yep. That’s because they are laying on the bottom. Once the temps rise and their hunger pains kick in it’s TIME! That’s usually around mid to late March and always by mid April they are back on their normal feeding pattern.

Now that we know about when the season starts, there are some other VERY important things to talk about before we go. Before I get started, let me say this: This IS NOT a sales pitch! If any of you have read my articles in the past you know that I am a nut about equipment. I see it every day. People come from all over the country and even North Alabama to fish here. They bring their own gear, spend hundreds of dollars on the trip and the first BIG red they hook up on gets away! Not because the fish shook the hook out, but because they didn’t take the time to service or have their gear serviced.
Lets start with reels. Oh it worked just fine last year, sure it did! But it’s sat up now for months. It needs oil or maybe one of the gears is going bad. Take in and get it serviced!

Line. “Well I only used it a couple of times.” Yeah right! It’s rotten sir! Replace it.
Rods. How do you service a rod? How about pulling a piece of cotton through each of the line guides and check for chips or cracks?
Hooks, are they sharp? Do they have a little rust on them? Has the paint gotten a little chip off.

All this is basic stuff, but we get so excited about going fishing that we sometimes forget the basics. Here’s the easy answer, take your gear to our friends at Marks. They will make sure everything is in top working condition so you won’t miss that MONSTER red fish!

Okay, I’ll get off the soap box now and talk fishing! In the spring you are looking for three main things to catch lots of red fish. The first is clean water. How clean? You want to be able to see at least a foot down. Just stick your rod tip down in the water one foot, if you can see the tip or your lure, get busy! The next is tide. Most people don’t give tide much thought, but ALL salt water fish feed on a rising or falling tide. The falling tide is the best because it washes bait fish and crabs out of the shallow water. We book trips months in advance using tide charts. You can find all the tide charts that you need on rodnreel.com.

Last and not least, bait. Red fish love crabs, it’s their primary diet, next is mullet, shad then shrimp. That part is really the easiest. Any marsh area with grass and cuts into the grass will have crabs in the area. Mullet, shad and shrimp can be found by simply idling along a shore or in a shallow bay. You’ll see them breaking the surface and when you do, get BUSY! The reds will be close by!

The last thing that I’ll touch on is lures. As I have said before, if I could have only one lure in my box it would be a Johnson Gold spoon! Quarter or half once, quarter for shallow clear water, half ounce for deeper cloudy water! My second choice would be a Top Dog or She Dog for top water action. You just can’t beat those choices for consistent production.

Well, that’s all for now folks. I hope everyone has a great year “catchin.”
Be safe and courteous on the water, keep what you’re going eat and please put the rest back for another day. Y’all take care!

—Capt. Raymond Griffin
Fishing Charters 1-800-741-1340 or www.griffinfishing.com