Pleasant surprise

Big redfish show up at Venice event despite storm damage

VENICE, La. – That fish often behave contrary to expectations is no revelation. However, as anglers competing in the Walmart FLW Redfish Series Western Division event at Venice Marina found out, such defiance can be a real blessing.

With Hurricane Gustav not so long departed from the northern Gulf of Mexico, the typically pristine marshes of the Mississippi Delta bear the scars of high-wind damage, while high water levels remain throughout the region. The net result, at least during pretournament practice days, has been displaced and dispersed redfish.

Most entered the event unsure of what they could or would find, and it’s safe to say that the general consensus was that weights would be down from the usually high Venice productivity.

The day-one leaderboard tells a different tale. Five teams caught a pair of reds in the 8-pound range, and 15 pounds goes all the way down to 19th place.

The top spot ended with a tie between Blair Wiggins and Travis Tanner of Cocoa and Titusville, Fla., respectively, and Brit Ordes and Mike Lambert, who hail from Slidell and Covington, La. Both teams caught two-fish limits weighing 16 pounds, 9 ounces.

For Wiggins-Tanner, the marsh south of the Wagon Wheel area held lots of aggressive fish that were plenty willing to knock the paint off a bone-colored MirrOlure She Dog.

“There were a lot of small fish in (that area) during practice, so we were surprised to see this size fish,” Wiggins said. “We knew there were big fish as well as the little fish in there, so I was throwing a topwater plug. I knew that if I got a bite, it was going to be a big fish.”

With two keepers in the well, Wiggins drew a big late-day strike that cemented his team’s position.

“We were able to upgrade at the second spot we hit. We were only there five minutes, caught that one, and he was right at 27 inches. That was the last fish we caught.”

Ordes-Lambert find deep well at Delacroix

Heading to Delacroix Island northeast of Venice proved to be a wise call for Ordes and Lambert. There, they found loads of redfish cruising the grass edges and used Berkley Gulp Shrimp on ¼-ounce jigheads. Ordes fished his bait deep, while Lambert added a cork to fish higher in the water column with a noisy presentation.

As expected, the Delacroix marsh was still swollen, but the productivity was undeniable.

“The water was still high, but we were catching tons of fish,” Ordes said. “There’s a lot of big fish in (that area). We lost three good ones today, but we still came up with our limit.”

Much to their delight, Ordes said the fish were quick to cooperate: “Our first fish came around 7:30, and our second one came around 9 o’clock so we had our limit pretty fast.”

Ritter-Billiot ride the tide for third

Fishing the delta’s west side, the third-place team of Scott Ritter and Chad Billiot targeted storm-damaged areas known as “busted-up marsh.” Hailing from Dauphin Island, Ala., and Raceland, La., Ritter and Billiot fished scented soft plastics under popping corks and spinnerbaits.

Their strategy was to key on marsh edges on the latter end of the falling tide, as the water draining from interior vegetation emerges cleaner from the natural filtration. Also, the outgoing flow brings baitfish and crustaceans to redfish waiting on the perimeter. Making noisy presentations with the popping corks and spinnerbaits grabbed redfish attention.

“We got one good one in the morning and one good one in the afternoon,” Billiot said. “Our biggest one came at the end of the day.”

With a high tide around 8 a.m., the anglers had to work through slow conditions as the lazy Louisiana tide took several hours to start rolling out with sufficient steam. Patiently waiting for the right conditions was the key, Ritter said.

“We just had to grind it out today. There was muddy water, it was windy and the water was a lot higher than we thought it was going to be this morning.”

Best of the rest

In fourth place, Barnie White of Brewton, Ala., and Steve White of Petal, Ala., had 16-5. Fifth place went to Mike Patterson and Brett Phillips, both of Rockport, Texas, who caught 16-1.

Rounding out the top 10 leading teams at the FLW Redfish Series Western event at Venice:

6th: Allen Kalisky and Billy Blackwood, 15-13

7th: Mike Donewar and Jay Moore, 15-11

8th: Tadd Vandemark and Kevin Shaw, 15-10

9th: Blake Pizzolato and Gene Quissenbery, 15-9

9th: Jim Hampton and Forrest Vollentine, 15-9

Walmart FLW Redfish Series action in Venice continues at Friday’s takeoff, scheduled to take place at 6:30 a.m. CDT at Venice Marina, located at 237 Sports Marina Road in Venice. Weigh-in starts at 3 p.m. at Venice Marina.