Keith Lusher Mandy Leahey of Pearl River has been fishing Bayou Lacombe a lot lately but hasn’t quite figured out the bass. “I’ve fished Bayou Lacombe 4 times in the past month and did not catch one fish,” Mandy says. That all changed on Mandy’s latest trip to the bayou. She launched at the Main St. Launch at 10:30 a.m. and paddled to the trace bridge that crosses the bayou. She decided to try a white and chartreuse spinner-bait but didn’t get any hits. Then she tied on a watermelon lizard with a 1/8 oz. bullet weight and started casting towards the shore.
Mandy Leahey catches her first bass on Bayou Lacombe “I casted a few times to the bank letting my lizard plop in the water from the bank and immediately got a strike right off the bank - and reeled in a 10 inch bass!” The kayak fisherman says. She continued to catch small bass with the plastic lizard when a bigger one hit. “As I headed down closer to the trestles of the bridge, I was drifting further away from the bank and got a hit about 6’ off of the bank. This bass was a fighter and it took a little while to wear him down, and then reel him in the kayak. When I measured him he was 12.5 inches,” Leahey says. The action slowed down around 3:30 P.M. and Mandy called it a day. She felt good about her catch especially since she witnessed other kayakers fishing with live shiners with nothing to show for it. “I was the only one who caught fish that day, so it made it pretty hilarious back at the dock that afternoon. There were lots of handshakes from the guys for catching them all on plastic,” Mandy laughs.
Tickfaw Sac-a-lait
With the warmer weather here, North Shore anglers are dealing with more boat traffic due to the increase in ski boats and jet ski’s. Robert Gauley of Maurapas usually fishes the Tickfaw River but says he decided to execute another plan of action. “The plan was to go down the Tickfaw and go up the Natalbany River to get out of the traffic,” Gauley says. But the Natalbany didn’t pan out like he expected with only a few crappie in the ice chest so he decided to brave the traffic and give the Tickfaw a shot. He started tight-lining a chartreuse and green jig along the submerged tree-tops. “We stopped at a few spots on the Tickfaw and despite the traffic and the muddy water we put a decent amount of fish in the box! It seemed like the more stirred up the water - the better they bit!” says Robert.
Hwy 51 Canal
Corey Cole of Ponchatoula says he’s been wondering if the perch were starting to bite in the Highway 51 canal. He decided to find out. “It was a nice morning with hardly any wind blowing so I decide to give it a try,” he says. Cole was using live worms and caught plenty of perch but had a hard time finding many keepers. “I caught a few, but threw back more than I kept. I couldn't catch anything with jigs, but live worms worked great!”
Tickfaw Sac-a-lait
With the warmer weather here, North Shore anglers are dealing with more boat traffic due to the increase in ski boats and jet ski’s. Robert Gauley of Maurapas usually fishes the Tickfaw River but says he decided to execute another plan of action. “The plan was to go down the Tickfaw and go up the Natalbany River to get out of the traffic,” Gauley says. But the Natalbany didn’t pan out like he expected with only a few crappie in the ice chest so he decided to brave the traffic and give the Tickfaw a shot. He started tight-lining a chartreuse and green jig along the submerged tree-tops. “We stopped at a few spots on the Tickfaw and despite the traffic and the muddy water we put a decent amount of fish in the box! It seemed like the more stirred up the water - the better they bit!” says Robert.
Hwy 51 Canal
Corey Cole of Ponchatoula says he’s been wondering if the perch were starting to bite in the Highway 51 canal. He decided to find out. “It was a nice morning with hardly any wind blowing so I decide to give it a try,” he says. Cole was using live worms and caught plenty of perch but had a hard time finding many keepers. “I caught a few, but threw back more than I kept. I couldn't catch anything with jigs, but live worms worked great!”
