Report submitted by 'Oz'

PINS Surf/Kayaking Mac-Attack Report Padre Island National Seashore, TX August 7-9th, 2008 Tweet

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Kip and I waited out the weather looking for some better than fair conditions. After Hurricane Dolly slammed South Padre, the beach has been a mess in terms of water clarity/temperature. A Tropical Storm had also just hit the northern part of the uppercoast earlier in the week. But the good news is weed was not a nuisance. Our plans were to go down and run big baits for big sharks, but if the toothies did not cooperate, then to Kayak fish if conditions permit.

I rocked down sunrise around 5:30am. Stopped to breakfast. One of the great luxuries in life is the breakfast tacos from Stripes... yeah buddy. Hit the beach as the sun was coming up.

Tide was going out but still high. I rocked down south and setup camp and put out some baits waiting for Kip. Whiting were hard to come by... I did pick up a small Bonnethead.

The Mullet surprisingly were quite thick along the beach, but no predators other than a plethora of Gafftop Catfish in the cool muddy water. Right before Kip showed up, I had a good run on one of the only Whiting I caught which was placed in first gut... ran and ran and dropped it. Probably a big ray.

Kip showed up and we messed around with the Gafftop for a while then got ready rigging up some big baits. Right before sundown we had 3 good baits deployed past the color change on the 3rd bar.

The first day we had 5 cutoffs but got all the leaders back. Not a single bait was touched overnight. Perhaps either the cool dirty water or even the Shrimpers pulled the sharks offshore, for now they were virtually non-existent along the beaches. Come sunrise we went out to pick up out leaders and with the conditions laying, decide to get ready to do an offshore kayaking adventure.

We get out far offshore and find the birds. Bonita (Little Tunnies) were everywhere along with Kings and Jacks. I trolled a deep-dive and immediately pick up a King.

King was Released

Kip was also in the action right off the bat. With an assult on the surface with Top-waters, the Kings were in a feeding frenzy. Kip jumps several and finally hooks one.

Kip's first King Mackerel of the trip...

I would continue to troll around and have the lure blasted a few times. I finally get hooked up on a solid 30lb+ King and fight him to the yak and he straightens the hooks before I can manage him. Fixed the hook issue and trolled around some more and get hit hard... but doesn't fight like a King. After a while I get in a Jack Crevalle which would be saved and run out later that nigiht.

Meanwhile, Kip would rockout another King.on the surface.

I would change lures on the one rod and while doing that throw down a Mullet. Somehow I managed to catch and release this monster from the deep.

Chasing the birds again, Kip would hammer a large Jack of his own

The wind picked up a bit and we duked it out for another hour or two trying something different and picked up several fish. The dirty water had moved all the way out to where we were anyway so we yakked back to camp.

That night we had fresh Jacks out. Through the night we though it was going to happen but we never turned a click. The next morning we brought in the baits and were virtually untouched other than a slight invasion by crabs.

The weather again was excellent in the morning and the seas were fairly calm. We decided since the shark bite is not on we'll duke it out offshore again. Took us a while and while we didn't see hardly any bird action, we did see a fair amount of surface action and we knew the Kings were out in full force again.

Kip would strike first with a top-water King.

The surface action was unreal. Top-water fishing was the name of the game today. You would cast out and have multiple breaches by King Macs and if they didn't take it, several would follow it to the kayak. Having actually brought some top-waters this day, I decided to slam them too. Instantly get hooked up and land/release my first King of the day.

Kip would soon strike back with another.

I would get another one after the release of the previous

The action was absolutely epic in terms of King Mackerel fishing. The most explosive and entertaining action I've had in the kayak in a while. I would soon land and release 2 more Kings on the same top-water before losing it on a good fish. While I should have brought more of the same design the only other top-water lure I had was a Yo-zuri without trebles. Though I would give it a try and sure enough just the movement of it walking on the surface would create chaos from down below. I soon get hooked up on the other lure.

A small group of birds would show up curious with the chaos. Kip went to chase them down and was greeted not by a King, but another large Jack.

After knocking out 5 Kings on Top-water lures, I would soon switch to drifting baits in hopes of larger Kings. Instantly I'd get one.

Then another...

and another..

and instantly another..

and after another couple or so I finally get my last King of the day.

On this fantastic day of days in the kayak, I would land and release 11 King Mackerel. For both days, Kip and I combined for 17 hard-fighting, torpedo breaching Kingfish, many on top-water lures. We gave it our best shot sharkfishing with fresh Jacks but the sharks were just not around. The water still remains horrible out to the 3rd bar but is currently weed free. Hopefully the coming days or weeks will clear up the water and warm it to the normal temps.

Until the next great weather window..

-Oz

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