Just for a moment, put yourself in the shoes (OK, OK - fins) of a big speckled trout. You've been relaxing in a mud flat in the East Matagorda bay. Finally, what you've been waiting for comes to pass; the light starts to peek through winter cloud cover, warming the shallows where you've been waiting out the winter.
You move through the waters of the mud flat looking for a familiar landmark; you soon come across that mud patch abutting a shell pad where you've spent some good times in your life, eating your fill of big shrimp and finger mullet by the hundreds.
You take up your favored feeding spot right where the mud meets the shell bed, watching the water above you for signs of a meal. You spot a delicious looking six inch mullet at two o' clock and get ready to spring into action.
Before the mullet even knows what happened, you're drifting back to the bottom feasting on your first catch of the season.
Only a moment later you see another one; this one looks like it's wounded. An easy catch, you chuckle to yourself as you prepare to pounce.
Your spotted body jumps back into attack mode and seals the wounded mullet's fate. Only this time the mullet fought back.
With a violent shake of your head you manage to get the mullet out of your mouth, but you find yourself pulled towards to the surface by a force you can't see - the struggle quickly tires you out, beaten by a Boga in your lip.
"Ten pounds at least!" a man yells.
Two other people come up and look you over approvingly. You think you see the flash of a camera.
Back in the water and exhausted from the escapade, you finally break free from the anglers' light hold.
"Courtesy of a Corky Fatboy!" is faintly heard as you dash back to the warming protection of your feeding ground.
If this is how a trophy trout really understood us when we talked, they'd know that in being tricked by the lure, they were making an angler's dream a reality.
When word broke out that James Wallace broke the state's speckled trout record, an infection had spread across the gulf coast; fishermen turned to an arsenal of Corky's, a slow sinking soft bait, when hunting for the trout of their lifetime. Packing the size of a topwater and the wobble of a broken-back, the tempting attraction of a slow retrieved Corky in winter is just flat out effective for trophy specks.
"It got crazy when Wallace caught that fish," states B&L Corky founder, Paul Brown. "Anglers poured into our shop and literally bought every single Corky off the shelf." Even after so many years, this Corky craze hasn't slowed in the Brown family's Houston-based shop.
Captain Mike McBride, a fishing guide in Port Mansfield is a man who knows Corkys well and uses these lures along with his own one of a kind retrieve to land speckled trout on the lower Texas coast.
"You'll definite work Corkys a little different depending where you are on the coast, but personally I pop the knot off when I'm trying to keep the slack under control." Against the common wisdom and frequent mentions in fishing reports, McBride doesn't use the ultra slow technique, preferring to work his lure vigorously. "The point of a Corky is that it makes those unpredictable movements that realistically imitate prey," McBride states.
Matagorda trophy trout guide Captain Jesse Arsola tells us that he has a specific technique for working Corkys saltwater fishing lures.
"When you're dealing with trout who are in an aggressive mood they'll bite just about anything. However, those times when you have to work at it to get them interested, that is when your technique really matters."
"I use a counting system nearly every time I work a Corky. Count how long it takes for the Corky to reach the bottom. Vary how many seconds you let the Corky fall before yanking the slack out of the line. Find out which count you are catching your fish on. This gives major insight in knowing which part of the water column the trout are feeding on best."
Captain John Havens is an accomplished tournament angler from Clear Lake who tells us that his favorite out of the many saltwater fishing lures he's tried is the Corky Devil, either in gold, chartreuse or white. He uses a standard retrieve with his Corky lures and claims this has always worked best for him.
"Make sure to stay in contact with the lure at all times to feel the most subtle of bites." When working a Corky Devil, Havens retrieves with a lift of the rod with one or two twitches before allowing the lure to fall.
You move through the waters of the mud flat looking for a familiar landmark; you soon come across that mud patch abutting a shell pad where you've spent some good times in your life, eating your fill of big shrimp and finger mullet by the hundreds.
You take up your favored feeding spot right where the mud meets the shell bed, watching the water above you for signs of a meal. You spot a delicious looking six inch mullet at two o' clock and get ready to spring into action.
Before the mullet even knows what happened, you're drifting back to the bottom feasting on your first catch of the season.
Only a moment later you see another one; this one looks like it's wounded. An easy catch, you chuckle to yourself as you prepare to pounce.
Your spotted body jumps back into attack mode and seals the wounded mullet's fate. Only this time the mullet fought back.
With a violent shake of your head you manage to get the mullet out of your mouth, but you find yourself pulled towards to the surface by a force you can't see - the struggle quickly tires you out, beaten by a Boga in your lip.
"Ten pounds at least!" a man yells.
Two other people come up and look you over approvingly. You think you see the flash of a camera.
Back in the water and exhausted from the escapade, you finally break free from the anglers' light hold.
"Courtesy of a Corky Fatboy!" is faintly heard as you dash back to the warming protection of your feeding ground.
If this is how a trophy trout really understood us when we talked, they'd know that in being tricked by the lure, they were making an angler's dream a reality.
When word broke out that James Wallace broke the state's speckled trout record, an infection had spread across the gulf coast; fishermen turned to an arsenal of Corky's, a slow sinking soft bait, when hunting for the trout of their lifetime. Packing the size of a topwater and the wobble of a broken-back, the tempting attraction of a slow retrieved Corky in winter is just flat out effective for trophy specks.
"It got crazy when Wallace caught that fish," states B&L Corky founder, Paul Brown. "Anglers poured into our shop and literally bought every single Corky off the shelf." Even after so many years, this Corky craze hasn't slowed in the Brown family's Houston-based shop.
Captain Mike McBride, a fishing guide in Port Mansfield is a man who knows Corkys well and uses these lures along with his own one of a kind retrieve to land speckled trout on the lower Texas coast.
"You'll definite work Corkys a little different depending where you are on the coast, but personally I pop the knot off when I'm trying to keep the slack under control." Against the common wisdom and frequent mentions in fishing reports, McBride doesn't use the ultra slow technique, preferring to work his lure vigorously. "The point of a Corky is that it makes those unpredictable movements that realistically imitate prey," McBride states.
Matagorda trophy trout guide Captain Jesse Arsola tells us that he has a specific technique for working Corkys saltwater fishing lures.
"When you're dealing with trout who are in an aggressive mood they'll bite just about anything. However, those times when you have to work at it to get them interested, that is when your technique really matters."
"I use a counting system nearly every time I work a Corky. Count how long it takes for the Corky to reach the bottom. Vary how many seconds you let the Corky fall before yanking the slack out of the line. Find out which count you are catching your fish on. This gives major insight in knowing which part of the water column the trout are feeding on best."
Captain John Havens is an accomplished tournament angler from Clear Lake who tells us that his favorite out of the many saltwater fishing lures he's tried is the Corky Devil, either in gold, chartreuse or white. He uses a standard retrieve with his Corky lures and claims this has always worked best for him.
"Make sure to stay in contact with the lure at all times to feel the most subtle of bites." When working a Corky Devil, Havens retrieves with a lift of the rod with one or two twitches before allowing the lure to fall.
About the Author:
Captain Kyle Tomek is a professional fishing guide who submits featured Texas fishing report to Texas FishCast. You can submit Texas fishing report through your Facebook account to Texas FishCast. You can share pictures and videos and tag your fishing buddies for everyone to see.
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