The View: December 2021

Our fall season has been a good one. A bay loaded with shrimp has proved prosperous for good catches. We continue to protect our speckled trout, but that doesn’t mean we haven’t been catching them. Many days we have played catch and release and boxed large sand trout for those wanting a few fillets.

We applaud TPWD for the news of tighter regulations for trout in 2022. Those new rules haven’t been finalized yet, but preliminary reports indicate a reduction on the daily bag limit and sizes.

The shell in Matagorda is full of fish and our trout really began to eat lures a lot better in October and November. Typically, that pattern only continues to improve in December. MirrOlure’s Soft-Dines, Bass Assassins, Down South Lures, Lil Johns, and an array of topwaters are our go-to baits.

I can remember when birds continued to work in a few Decembers along the east end of East Matagorda Bay and I believe that will be the case this year as well. However, by mid to late month most of the white shrimp crop have left the bays and speckled trout adapt their diet to finfish. That’s when slow-sinking mullet imitating plugs like Corkys go to work.

Raymond Shoals, Boiler Bayou, Pipeline Reef and Cleveland Reef hold good fish during the winter; and, when tides are extremely low, shoreline redfish move off the flats to these reefs in the middle of the bay.

Locales receiving the most tidal flow often hold the majority of schools – that means reefs and mud flats adjacent to the Intracoastal Waterway in East Bay. Brown Cedar Flats, Chinquapin Reefs, Bird Island, Half-Moon Reef, and the Log are all proven winter spots holding healthy specks.

Drifting is also an option, especially with the height of the low-tide winter Solstice occurring in December. East Bay is often 2-3 feet below normal in December, depending how hard the north wind blows.

When the wind really blows, never discount the Colorado River. Low tides in West Bay drain the delta at the mouth of the Diversion Channel and funnel all fish to the deep channel. Nighttime is even better under lighted piers as fish seek the warmth of the river’s depths.

Matagorda Mixed-Bag Opportunity in December