Going fishing off Padre. Any tips/advice?

[r.barn]

I love fishing the intercoastal with live shrimp on a bobber.

Doesnt take any technique, works like a charm and catch all kinds
of fish all day long.

Nice thing about salt over fresh water fishing is the fish are a lot more
aggressive about taking bait, so getting something on the hook is a no brainer.

[cjriojas]

can i ask why i should'nt eat a salt water cat? i caught a 20" cat and it still in the freezer. i havent eaten it yet.

The only reason not to is if there is an advisory about pollution or bacteria in the water. Otherwise, they should be fine.

Fishing: Saltwater Catfish, poisonous spines, reef cat

Thanks for the link. The locals had told me not to eat them because they contained a much higher level of toxins than fresh cat. However, i did a little research and found that you can eat them and that they even taste pretty good.

Haha, I'm probably not going to buy a very nice saltwater setup, but my freshwater setups have grown considerably.

I was given an American Rodsmith Titanium 6'6" rod by a pro fisherman friend. I ended up throwing that on.

I think I'm going to invest in another Falcon rod since I've gotten quite used to it. I'm tempted to try on of the Carrot Stix rods as well.

I now have accumulated:
2 Abu Garcia Bait Cast Reeds(Both fairly old, but were around $150 in new condition)
Shimano Chronarch Baitcast reel($200 reel given to me for free)
Shimano left hand Baitcast reel($100 reel, My favorite, bought at an estate sale for $3.50)
Pfluger Spinning rod combo(Present from my girlfriend, smoothest action I have yet to feel)

Basically I have about $1000 in rods/reels at this point, I just need to learn how to fish better. The good part of it though is that I got two of the reels for $3.50, one for free that needed about $15 in parts, the other was a present from my girlfriend, and the other my dad never uses.

Cheap/Free stuff is always cool!

Sounds like you got a good little arsenal goin on for pretty much nothing lol. Shrimp and squid are common baits and arent very expensive. Take a bucket so you can get live sardines or other baitfish. They work well also.

[randomhero]

Ended up doing alright. Between 3 of us(My dad, girlfriend and me) we caught 19 specs, 3 reds, and 1 Atlantic Croaker. We caught well over 50 fish total, but only those 23 keepers. My girlfriend caught a total of 5 reds, but only 1 keeper, we each caught 1 red and I had the largest at right around 26"

[cjriojas]

dam, i need to go on a charter. That looks like a good time. What did u end up using for bait? How long were u on the water?

[randomhero]

dam, i need to go on a charter. That looks like a good time. What did u end up using for bait? How long were u on the water?

We were on the water for a long time(about 10 hours). We caught about half the fish during the first 2 hours, then didn't catch a single thing from 9-12. After that we started catching quite a bit of them.

We are using a really simple rig setup. Braided 20 lbs line with a surgeons not to connect the leader. There was a croaker hook with a bead and another surgeon and we were throwing piggy perch and croakers out there.

The red fish were caught on 3 different pieces of the same cut up perch.