Shallow wading, right lure prove very helpful

Charlie Paradoski's boat skimmed across the shallow water of East Matagorda Bay, heading to a sprawling flat where he had left the fish biting the previous afternoon.

The water on the flat was shindeep and just clear enough to see your shoes.

"What I suggest doing is spreading out and slowly fishing our way toward that pass," said Paradoski, who's been guiding fishermen to reds and trout along the Texas Gulf coast for over 30 years. When he speaks, fishermen tend to listen. We did, and caught fish, lots of fish. Mostly big reds.

We made one pass across the flat and didn't catch too much of anything. "Something's not right," surmised Paradoski, as we met at the boat. "Let's go try a reef on the other side of the bay, then come back here in an hour or so. The reds will be here today. It's just a matter of us being here when they move onto the flat and begin feeding."

Truer words were never spoken.

We returned about two hours later and had one of the most incredible wade fishing experiences that I've had in a long time. The reds seemed to be everywhere. And for a while we couldn't make a cast without getting hooked up.

Wonderful thing about this recent wade fishing experience is that the reds were in about 18 inches of water. And they were not too casual about how they busted our lures. It was as good as fishing gets on the flats.

In my way of thinking there is nothing finer than wading "skinny" water and taking big reds on topwater plugs. They cause quite a commotion when charging a lure in water that's barely deep enough to hide their tails.

Speaking of tails, we ran into a school of tailing reds on the far end of that flat. But, typical of the way fishing can be, they wouldn't have anything to do with what we had to offer.

Not one to get skunked on his home turf, Paradoski eased over to a shallow gut on the flat and scored first with a big red that ripped into a bone-colored Spook. Once it was determined what those fish wanted, they were easy pickings. But all good things come to an end. And that wild topwater bite ended after we had caught several reds.

Perplexed, I tied on a black/glitter Assassin, something I knew those reds hadn't seen before. It got whacked on the first cast. And on the next three casts, too. That was too much for Paradoski, the 1998 TroutMasters Pro Angler of the Year.

"What are you using?" he yelled from across the flat.

I held up the Assassin. It's the newest color being made by Bass Assassin Lures out of Mayo, Fla. It was murder on the reds, and later fooled a few trout.

It actually out-fished the red shad Assassins that have been so deadly along the coast the past few years.

That new color is called Morning Glory. It's pretty hot on the middle and lower coast of Texas right now, a closely guarded secret, come to find out. I suspect it'll be murder on Sabine Lake reds. That new color should be stocked on tackle store shelves right about now. If you can find them, you might want to stock up. I'm thinking that Morning Glory Assassins will be sold out in a hurry.

Sabine Lake guide Jerry Norris says he's been doing pretty good with a limetreuse Assassin. That's another new color. Norris has been experimenting with it for the past couple of months, and says it's a killer.

Both Paradoski and Norris favor the 5-inch shad Assassins.

Paradoski fishes Assassins quite a bit. He rigs them on screw lock Assassin heads. That type of head keeps the plastic bait from slipping down the shank of the hook. In shallow water you'll do best with a 1/8-ounce head. It delivers a slower fall and lots of action. In water that's over 4 feet deep a 1/4-ounce head is probably best. I'm not sure that the color of the head has much to do with anything. But just in case, the plain lead head seems to be pretty popular among the pros.

For details on fishing with Capt. Charlie Paradoski on East and West Matagorda Bays give him a call at (281) 343-0221.

Capt. Jerry Norris, with The Original Sabine Lake Guide Service, can be reached at (409) 736-3023.

Robert Sloan is the outdoors editor of The Beaumont Enterprise.