March Madness on the Gulf Coast
By By Otha Barham / outdoors editor
March 21, 2003
Cliff Covington, an outdoor writer from Port Gibson, was our other partner in the boat. He showed more self control, concentrating on hooking a big red fish of his own. Cliff provided the early concepts of the Catch a Dream program that grants wishes of outdoor experiences to youngsters with life threatening disabilities and diseases.
A friend for more than 30 years, Tom Crowe had joined me for a visit to the home and charter boat headquarters of Captain Bobby Bryan. Bryan, his wife Juanita and their large family operate Marsh Masters Guide Service in Leeville, Louisiana. Leeville is just about as far south from New Orleans as you can get.
One of nature's treasure troves most appreciated by outdoor enthusiasts is the marsh country. Marshes parallel rivers, lakes and our seas and oceans, covering millions of acres world wide. Most marshes teem with wildlife and thus attract sportsmen and women.
Nearby Marsh
A favorite nearby marsh is the low country that borders the Gulf of Mexico. Fresh water pours into the Gulf coastal marsh in abundant streams that drain the land of rainfall that can average 60 inches a year in much of the Southeast.
Where the runoff meets the Gulf's salt water and floods the shallows, the mixture that we describe as brackish is home to birds, mammals and fish that have adapted to the marsh environment as well as the microscopic life that supports them.
A healthy marsh teems with wildlife and attracts hunters and anglers who harvest a share of the bounty. Like all the truly wild places in our land, the brackish marsh can be an inspiring and generous place that can also become a dangerous place. Its briny flats can hold limits of red fish and speckled and white trout. But they are vulnerable sites for thunder storms with violent winds and lightning. And coastal marshes are ideal spots for dense fog. But these characteristics can typify wild country that so attracts us.
Bobby Bryan visited the Louisiana marsh country over a dozen years ago, fell in love with it and moved his family there from their home in north Louisiana. Taking people fishing was his calling and the family would embrace the endeavor and turn it into a thriving business.
In the afternoon of our first day of a two-day trip last week, we finally found the speckled trout. The silvery fish were smashing soft baits; shrimp imitations rigged beneath popping corks. The bite coincided with a gathering of dark clouds in the northwest. We only got to fish a few minutes before the storm forced us to take off for the landing.
Just in time
We got spattered with large raindrops as we secured the boat and dashed into a dockside shelter. While we waited out the rain, we watched a huge bolt of lightning strike the bridge over the Bayou Lafourche canal just a couple hundred yards away.
Cliff had to leave that evening, and the next morning Captain Bryan loaded Tom and me into a larger craft and sped off to the oil rigs that lie at the edge of the blue water. The rigs produced limits of huge mangrove snapper. The fish, that weighed 6 pounds to 13 pounds, bit dead bait lowered from our boat to the bottom at the bases of the oil rigs.
Tom hung a huge fish, perhaps a giant grouper, that he could not move but a few inches at a time with his heavy rod bent nearly double. He asked me if I thought the 50 pound test leader would stand even more pressure than he was applying. I answered that I didn't think a fish could break that leader. Well, a minute later the line snapped like sewing thread. So much for my advice.
We released large red fish that nailed our baits. And shortly after noon, we headed back to solid ground with 30 big snappers in the ice chest. Overcast skies and moderate temperatures made this March fishing trip a pleasant experience.
Contact Captain Bobby Bryan at Marsh Masters by telephone (985) 396-2411. Check their website at www.marshmasters.com. Send an E-mail to marshmasters@mobiletel.com.
