http://www.LouisianaSportsman.com April 2015 | Louisiana Sportsman 169
pointing at a picture of Pelayo and me dressed to kill under the
disco ball at Spinnakers in Panama City.
“And check out those abs — whooo-whooo!” adds Melissa,
while pointing at Artie and Chris posing on the beach near the
old Miracle Strip pier. “Ain’t dat AAAW-nold Schwarzenegger?!
What happened?”
Fair is fair.
So for relief, we (the guys) all ran to the porch. Trisha followed
and approached Artie, just as he was catching his breath.
“I was getting Nana Fontaine’s (Doc’s mom) recipe for crawfish
bisque yesterday,” Trisha said to Artie. “And she asked me to
remind y’all to save her some cigar trout. She wants to fry some
up for Lent —but what’s a cigar trout?”
Trisha frowned while looking around. “I thought I was quite
familiar with most of the fish,” she said.
“Haven’t heard DAT term in a while!” Pelayo laughed and
jumped into the conversation. “Well, Trisha, let’s just say that
you’ve caught a bunch of them yourself. Doc calls them ‘dinks,’
right before throwing them back. The term was popular WAY
before size limits on speckled trout. So it ain’t dere no more.”
“And we’ll get Nana plenty of them!” Artie blurted. “As you well
know, we ain’t trophy fishermen any more than trophy deer-
hunters. So, if our trip tomorrow goes off as planned, Nana will
have plenty cigar trout for her Lenten meals. Don’t worry.”
Indeed, the “Cajun computer” on Pelayo’s boat has those all-
important ( for us) 12-inch and 16-inch marked in big, bold black
to make sure nothing delicious (and legal) gets thrown back.
“And oh: Nana Fontaine also wants a redfish,” Trisha said. “She
says she’s going to make something she called, um, um cooo-
bee-yon or something? What’s ... ?”
“Got it covered, Trish!” Artie whooped.
“But she says she wants a whole one. She says you guys waste
too much meat,” Trisha said. “She wants it scaled so ....”
“DONE!” Artie yelled as Doc walked up.
“Cut the girl some slack,” Doc laughed. “Poor thing grew up
in the Hamptons. How’s she supposed to know about stuff like
cigar trout and courtbouillon?”
“Man, I still remember getting that whole fried trout at
Fitzgeralds!” Pelayo said. “Finally dawned on me — shoot man,
I can do that with MINE, too!”
Yes, amazingly, people used to actually scale fish! And fry and
bake them whole! Specks in the frying pan. Reds in the baking
dish — because the only conceivable use for reds in that distant
era was for courtboullion. So they were usually scaled, gutted
and left whole for that procedure.
Artie was right. We were primed to supply Nana Fontaine with
everything she needed — along with the supplies for Doc’s own
“Lenten Kickoff Fish Extravaganza” scheduled for the forth-coming evening at his camp.
Some blustery east winds, so typical of this time of year, prom-
ised especially good conditions (high tides covering grassy
shorelines) for catching the makings of courtboullion.
“It’s all about the salty waaaw-da,” has become a popular
lament amongst us lately — especially during high river levels
in spring and early summer when we’re running around like
crazy catching nothing but hardheads. (And not many of them,
actually. They’re a saltwaaaw-da fish, too, after all.)
Well, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist (or hydrologist or biolo-
gist) to look at a map and figure out why we target the area
around the mouth of the MRGO in April. The Pearl River’s
high ( freshening the upper Biloxi marsh). The Mississippi
River’s high ( freshening much of Delacroix area through the
Caernarvon diversion, plus areas farther south along the south-
western edge of Breton Sound through Mardi Gras Pass, Bayou
Lamoque, Ostrica, etc.).
This coastal area east of Hopedale and Shell Beach is almost
evenly distanced from these freshwater sources — and thus
forms a pocket with the highest salinities around at the time.
Nothing to it.
In fact, you might say these super-low salinities recently along
our southeastern coast simplify things for us. Sure, it’s a nice
little haul out to Bay Eloi or Lake Machais from Hopedale or
Shell Beach. But once you’re there, the fishing doesn’t (usually)
require repeatedly picking up and hauling long distances to
find the fish, as might be the case elsewhere.
I mean, you launch outta Venice and you might run from the
Jump to the rocks at Southwest Pass to Sandy Point looking for
fish — a 70-mile trip.
Around the mouth of the MRGO, on the other hand, the
action’s a bit more localized this time of year. The high salinities
(relatively speaking) seem to account for this. The blustery east
winds would surely muddy up the open water, making what are
generally considered as iffy conditions for specks.
But for us this, again, simplifies matters. When the water’s
calm and clear, specks can be anywhere — abundant perhaps,
but scattered.FACING PAGE: High winds and murky water actually improve conditions for
redfishing in this area, especially along flooded grassy shorelines.
RIGHT: Most of the specks caught are schoolies, but a few mules always
show up. For whatever reason, these are always the first to clobber shrimp-
tipped jigs around points and current lines.