Is the redfish run in the mitigation site over you ask? Ed shows us the answer. He caught these 24 and 26 inch reds this evening on "old" cut perch. He had left the perch chunks in the frig a few days, not purposefully. He and I had  gone out for about 2 hours before sunset today and had no luck at all. No wonder, all the keepers are right out here. Last night Alvin had a big stringer of about six nice drum. There was one 26 inch red caught off the pier today in mid afternoon.
I had wondered about getting my boat out today. The north wind had driven the tide down about a foot and dropped the water temperature to 67. However, when we went through the channel, I didn't even have to trim up the engine. I guess the engineer is correct we have reached equilibrium and it's not going to get any worse.

I've kinda gotten behind on the posts, but as they say, "so many fish and so little time."
Wednesday Marv and I took my boat out and drifted the HEB shoreline, Goose Island shoreline and Scotch Tom reef with nary a nibble. We did see some pelicans working in our path coming off of Scotch Tom. When we drifted into them, they were over some extra large gafftops. We caught a few, but did not keep any even though they were big.  Yesterday, Ed, a high school friend of mine staying in 603, and Marv went out with me.  Ed had been spoiled with a 26, 28 and 29.5 inch reds from the mitigation site this week and expected we would kill them in the boat. Not true. Marv picked up a 16.5 inch trout at Paul's Mott on a DOA and Ed got a 15.1 inch trout at the base of marker 25 on live shrimp. At Tommy Martin's, former owner of 501 and now deceased, spot I had a big hit on my DOA. It turned out to be about the largest gafftop I have ever seen.  Since I didn't have anything in the box, I went ahead and kept it. The fillets are big enough for two meals. Of course, one meal of gafftop is not all that much.
Tuesday evening at 6 pm we had an hour and a half video conference call with the engineers in Austin, Sea Shell Shores, and Phase II representatives concerning the dredging of our channel. They had some pretty good news for us. The engineer said he feels we have reached equilibrium with the sedimentation in our channel. It doesn't seem to be getting any worse and I had no problem getting my boat out on Wednesday and Thursday. We talked about not dredging so deep this time. We are permitted for 6.5 feet deep, but that gradient just makes it fill back in faster. It appears that maybe only 2.5 feet deep might last just about as long.  The patches we did inhouse where the concrete joins the shoreguard seem to have helped too. We have a maintenance permit to dredge anytime.  The only problem is what to do with what we take out. One of the owners of a house at  Sea Shell Shores had a survey of the area behind his house and it showed no significant seagrass. It this is true, we can just dump it over the south wall of the breakwater and save a lot of cash.  I think we were all pretty glad to hear the report.

Alvin's friend, Brandi, shows off her biggest red ever. It was not quite a keeper, but she was very proud of it. She caught it all be herself on a live mullet.  Wes caught another 26 incher earlier in the evening on cut mullet again. It's still a mystery how so many reds can be in such a small area as the mitigation site. In talking to Greg this evening, we considered the idea that maybe the reds are coming through the culvert from the HEB pond. In years past we could see reds in that area and some fished there. Later HEB put up the fence and "keep out" signs.  Recently, I have not seen any tailing reds on the HEB side so maybe they have moved to our side of the road. The culvert was not open until last fall when Jack Gibbs used his mini excavator to dredge it out and allow the water to flow.
Welcome to another new owner, Travis Sword. He is Tony's son. We all know Tony for all the good work he did in the remodels with Rob.

A conduit was run from the corner of the tennis court to the post that the bird house is mounted on to provide a power outlet for the charging of boat batteries. Now the only problem will be getting around Brian's(215) big pontoon boat to reach other boats.

Work continues on the remodel of 608. Keith has been really busy after taking on two remodels at one time.

The extra tall Whataburger sign needed to be painted. It looks as if they are painting it in place. No, they are taking it down piece by piece, painting the pieces, and then reinstalling the pieces.

Greg may be the first from Minnesota to arrive this fall, but I think he knows the early bird gets the worms as he shows off two of the big reds he bagged this week.

This evening Marv and Rita took me to dinner at Alice Faye's. Their Wednesday special is prime rib and I had never tried one. It was really excellent and I'll be doing that again. They beat K-Bob's every day.
Rita had the New York Strip steak, but had some difficulty dining. Seems as how yesterday she broke her right arm. She says dining is not the only thing that will prove to be a challenge. Marv is quite patient and helpful to her. He said he had some practice when she had her knee replacement.
Everyone knows these sliding glass door we deal with here are sometimes difficult to open. Rita had tried to open theirs with one hand, something I tried and could not do, and the result was the broken arm.  She said the local Urgent Care Center did a great job of taking care of her.

It's been a month since the party with the mechanical bull, dunking booth, and live band, but it is still a talking point among owners. The biggest problem seems to be that no one knew about it. It's not unlike all the cats around here. We have as many as I've ever seen and while some feed them others see them as a problem. The cartoon below says it all. It's mostly a matter of perspective.

Here is a look back at 1994. My boat is still parked in the same slot. My son,  Ryan, is 29 now.
There is a story behind the dingy parked behind me. I was HOA president and the property manager asked my about this dingy. We checked on the license plate number and it belonged to no one we knew, so I told her to haul it away. It had been there a long time.
Within a few days I heard from the previous HOA president. He was pretty hyper. He said he had purchased it and never changed the title. The towing company wanted $400 to bring it back.  We went back and forth and  finally agreed to split the cost to have it brought back. This is the one and only time that I know of when a boat or vehicle was towed from the property.

Today I noticed that the Texas Dept. of Insurance has posted the work that was done on our foundation. This can be viewed by going to their site and entering our address. Just use 2292 and %fulton and then Rockport. The county is Aransas. https://apps.tdi.state.tx.us/windstormsearch/start.jsp

The recent rains have the Sago Palms looking nice.
As of this evening the reds are still being caught in the mitigation site. I saw a 23 and a 25 inch caught with about 10 minutes of each other at dusk. They both hit cut mullet.
I had some fish fried at Moon Dog's.  It is the same price as Alice Faye's, but the not nearly as good.

Alvin got in on the fun in the mitigation site this evening too. Since his usual spot was taken, he moved his security checkpoint to the next streetlight toward the boat ramp. He put on a dead shrimp and within minutes this 28 inch red took the bait. Alvin had Brandi run, yes run, all the way around the boat ramp and halfway down the crossbridge to get a net. Maghsoud(407) manned the landing net and they brought in the catch. If you enlarge the photo and look carefully near Alvin's left thumb, you will see that the red had a green looking bass assassin still hooked in its mouth from an earlier encounter. The bass assassin was rigged with a swivel, steel leader, and red mono. Not the best rig, but I guess it worked. I just wonder where that happened since I've never seen anyone use a rig like that in the mitigation site.
Brandi had borrowed the net from Vic(712) who had used it to wade into the mitigation site to try to recover the broken line he had experienced earlier. Vic had used a float and we could see the float moving around the mitigation site as the fish pulled it around. Vic waded in and chased it all over, but never could quite get it.
I've heard from several blog readers lately who have seen my posts about the recent catches. This morning Phillip Buffkin called and said he wanted to get in on the action. Things are pretty booked, but I told him 502 would be a good choice and put him close to the action.

The reds continue to be caught in the mitigation site, or as Jim(210) has named it, Lake Mitigation. Ben Rowlett is holding a 22 incher he caught on a silver spoon this afternoon.  Notice the two dots.

This evening Brent caught these two reds on cut mullet. I was fishing right next to him when he caught these. I had soaked a DOA in Gulp juice for over a year and thought this evening was the time to break it out. I was getting good bites, but could not set a hook. After about an hour I looked at the DOA and guess what? Over time the Gulp juice had rusted off the last 1/8th inch of the hook and I had nothing to catch the fish with. Live and learn.
At dawn this morning I was fishing with my usual gold spoon and Ric was using the same spoon right next to me. A 22 inch red decided to slam his spoon instead of mine, so no reds for me today.
Yesterday, Joe and Bev Fischer, caught four nice drum and four good sized croaker from the mitigation site. The largest drum was 20 inches.

Our pool pump made its last revolution today. Al brought a new one out this afternoon and installed it. The pump alone was about $300. The old one appeared to be a 2003 model.
On Sunday evening I saw the red warning light "on" on the lift station again. I hope that pump is not going to give us a problem too.

I've been working to repair the termite damage in my den area. Modern tools make the job much easier. I did not find any live termites and if fact, I have not seen any on the property this whole year. Last year they were everywhere. I asked the workers who worked on our foundation and they said they saw no evidence of termites there either.  Through the years our worst termite problems have been in the walls where the wood is not treated to protect it.

Scott proves again his love of projects. I think he is always in the process of finishing one project, starting the next, and envisioning another.  Here he is showing his flounder light project. He saw something like this on the internet and built his own. The two LED lights were purchased at Lowe's for $20 each and produce 300 lumens each. He then put in a fuse and switch and has a 12v battery pack to put on his back and he is set to go. Now all he needs is the right water conditions which should not be too far off as the fall weather gets entrenched.

This was the scene at Seafair on Saturday. Every year I say it was bigger than ever and I believe that really is the case. People were parking their cars all the way back to the old Duck Inn. The weather was perfect and I'm sure they made a ton of money.

Have you ever wondered what a lawn chair would look like after several years under the water? Someone fished this one up this weekend from the channel behind the 400 building. The chair integrity looks good, but a few oysters have taken up residence. I really think it may have some value once it is washed up a bit, a conversation piece at the very least.

My first cast with the gold spoon last Thursday evening produced this 26.5 inch red from the mitigation site. A few casts later I landed a 22 inch red. Reds are not my favorite table fare and I was able to give both of these away. The extra shirt is not because it's been cool, but the mosquitos go right through one shirt.