Johnsfolly

I was hoping to get two new states this year - AL and OR. Alabama is not likely to happen but still have hope to get a few OR fish in Nov.

I also love catching brown trout. Wished that we lived closer to fish the fall Taney browns.

Link to the orange nurse shark https://share.google/images/ELI3NDiOhe0Va4fGD

Last Week I was back down in Texas for a business conference in Houston. I added a couple of days to the trip to get back out for new fish species that I was not able to fish or catch on my last trip back in Nov. I had planned for some freshwater and saltwater fishing. The first afternoon found me trying to find fishable access to the White Oak Bayou. I headed to Woodland park just north of downtown Houston. The creek banks in most spots had 4 to 10 ft drops down to the water. Most of the walking trail looked like this between the trail and the water ... I did find three access points, but still needed some mountain goat footing to fish the bank in the one access point. Fortunately the banks were sand which provided some grip. My targets were grass carp and spotted gar. Long story short, I saw both but they stayed out of casting range or on the down stream side of deadfalls that I could not get below and cast back upstream. I did have one gar that was tight up under some brush upstream of me. I made a cast and hung in the brush and a small sunfish grabbed the cutbait. That got me unhung and the gar came out and chased the sunfish. It ignored the cutbait and didn't respond to any of my other casts. I tried chumming for the carp using bread and strawberry dough baits. I just ended up feeding the turtles. I even landed one🙄. I saw a decent mirror pearl colored koi but it dissappeared quickly. I did catch a couple of sunfish and a Texas cichlid, all on bait. I did see a bunch of established exotic finches, scaly breasted munias. Bluegill Plains longear TX Cichlid The next morning had me running an hour down to Galveston Island. I felt certain that the small inlet to the East End Lagoon off of the shipping channel would be my best shot at catching some lifers. I had been in contact with one of the Houston area INAT folks for the past year and they have caught at least four species from that area that would be lifers for me. I typically don't like blind casting for micros, but on my first cast into the current I landed the first of my targets, a flagfin mojarra! I caught several of these guys. I also fished the schools of minnows looking for longnose and/or diamond killifish. I caught a bunch of the longnose killies, another lifer😉. I didn't find or have any luck on diamond killies. I tied on a larger hook and tossed out my shrimp. I would get bit as soon as I came tight. Nearly all of those fish were pinfish. I did land a small gray snapper and a cool looking pigfish. Redfish and gulf/southern flounder were also targets for this trip. That afternoon I headed to Sea Wolf Park to try for any of those species. The fish report board at the park had folks catching croakers, sand weakfish, ladyfish and kingfish. I still hadn't caught a ladyfish or a gulf kingfish. I fished a variety of baits and setups, high low rigs with shrimp or fishbites, fish finding rigs with cutbaits or tadem jig rigs with gulp minnows or swimming mullets. I caught a lot of croakers on the high low rigs with shrimp and the fishbites. I did land a couple of lifer ladyfish and a bunch of sand weakfish (aka sand trout), Even a southern kingfish - but not a Gulf king😒. Photos of the park. After dark I headed back to East end lagoon to do some night fishing. I was hoping to find some small flounder species or another target - the darter goby. Even with my brightest light setting I could only see about 12 to 16 inches deep and my red light setting was not useful at all. I saw a bunch of mullets that spooked at every opportunity. I saw more longnose killifish that refused to bite my shrimp. I also found what I thought must be the darter gobies and they also did not bite. I only caught one frillfin goby. Saturday was either going to be another saltwater or freshwater trip. Since I saw the possible darter gobies and still wanted to try and catch a redfish or gulf kingfish, I went back down to the Gulf to fish. I should have predicted that the beaches would be crowded since it was a decent Saturday. The first couple of spots were too crowded for me to feel comfortable fishing. Lost me a lot of fishing time. I ended up in Galveston Island State Park. There was a decent sized lagoon with a couple of folks already fishing. I started by microfishing a small outlet channel. Only bites were crabs. I saw two of the other folks catch puppy redfish on shrimp in the lagoon. I put on a tandem jig rig and fished 1.5 inch Gulp minnows and 1 inch pearl swimming mullets. I would get bites on each cast. No hook ups and often the tails would be bitten off the baits. Switched up to a high low rig with smaller hooks and caught a couple of pinfish, the likely culprits biting off the tails. I switched back to the tandem jig rig with a 3 inch chartruese swimming mullet and the pearl mullet bait. I got a decent bite that wasn't fighting like a pinfish. The body shape was right for a redfish, but instead it was a croaker😒. With the diamond killifish and the possible darter goby targets I headed back to the East End lagoon. The diamond killifish has a shorter body length like a sheepshead minnow but with a deeper body. I had on my tanago hook with shrimp and casted out to a school of fish that did not look like longnose killies. Turns out they were more flagfin mojarras. I caught a bunch before moving on. Close to where I saw them the night before I found about 6 or so gobies that could be the darter goby. They were only about 1.5 to 2 inches in length. They were agressive but since they were so small it was hard to get a hook set. I did lift one and finally got the largest one into the photo bag! Turned out to be the darter goby and the fourth lifer of my trip (would be my last as well). I had a great trip. I suspect that I will be back in TX in the near future and hope to get back after those targets that I didn't catch and maybe a few others as well.

I have seen an orange green sunfish and nurse shark articles lately. Is the incidence of these genetic oddities increasing or are more folks out there fishing?

Sea Wolf Park Sunset - Galveston TX

Now I have been fishing but until I post a trip report enjoy this😉

They eat snails throughout their range.

Haven't been fishing since that shark trip. I will this weekend though. I will be renting a car and thought this was an appropriate meme😉😆

Go old School and get the chartreuse color that @Sethalways wore🤔. I've gone to three plus a Taneyfest. Does that warrant a shirt?

I found that if you slowly get in the water and wait five to ten minutes they tend to forget you are there. Just don't be too visible with your casting. I also like to wear light camo when chasing spooky trout.

Looks like a fun time for the Billetheads😉 Maybe we'll go some year.

Shooting deer with paintball guns might catch on as a catch and release hunting strategy😆

Hopefully Daryk it would be beyond the statute of limitations. That wouldn't be the case if you were running for political office or appointed as a judge😂!

Maybe it was E Jean Carroll. She painted a bunch of trees blue😉. We don't have blue but we do have a lot of local luecistic (piebald or white) and melanistic (black) squirrels running around (also a fair number of piebald deer). Problem is that they are in town. If I found them on public hunting areas, I would love to get a ying/yang taxidermy squirrel mount😉😁

I've tried them once and am not a fan. Maybe I just didn't have them cooked right😜😂

I still have several of my better mixed tapes kicking around😁

You could predict that cassette tapes were done when we no longer used pencils and when Bic pens were made round instead of hexagonal.😉🤔😂

@Travis Swift Still sounds like a great trip!

Back in college in PA we used to get hot dogs at a place called Yacco's. They had their own chili sauce, onions and mustard. My friend would eat a dozen in a sitting. The family that owned the place were relatives of Lee Iaccoca. We didn't have White Castles near us. I've only eaten there a couple of times.

All of the redeye bass subspecies that have now been upgraded to species level over the last several years look very similar to smallmouth bass. They like the Bartram's bass are found in distinct river systems in SC, GA, AL, etc. They are all genetically different from each other. I have been seeing this bass being reported and I believe that it was one of the subspecies at the time that made up the GA black bass slam.

I'm out aready😑! I will be out in CA for a business trip.

I thought they may want you to lay down in the back😉