re: Video of big school of bull reds

I was fortunate enough to experience one. It was me and my two brothers heading from the Mardi Gras rig to Racoon Point, and like the video, all you seen was tails splashing every where. We stopped the boat quick and watched it for a minute. It was awesome. Then we fishe until we couldn't lift our arms It didn't matter what we threw, your line was screaming with the quickness!

I've seen tuna like that and salmon like that. Never reds. That is awesome.

Saw that only they were almost side by side off of Last Isle maybe 3-4 years ago, with witnesses, no pics. Hooked 4, got spooled on one, brought 3 in., turned them loose.

it happens every year at the grand isle state park pier in september, you just have to be there. im talking about schools of reds but i've never seen them boil the water like in the video.

Been through a school like that between Ship and Horn Islands while deckhanding on a charter boat in college, it covered about two acres. There were probably thirty charter boats weaving in and out of it for thirty minutes, how no one crossed lines or hit each other still amazes me.

I used to hear stories of great redfish schools for miles and always thought they were bullshite.

Then about 2001 we begin to see them south for horn and ship island. I remember one day we caught almost 20 redfish all over 20 lbs a few over 40 in almost consecutive cast. It took about 20-30 minutes to land them as we were fishing with heavy surf rods and 20-30 lb test. (Only keep two of the smaller ones) They were feeding on red minnows and the school was over a mile long and from a few hundred yards to a 1000 yards across. I have some pics somewhere, where you can see the red schools.
I think they are just regular pics as this was pre iphone cameras. On one cast I actually caught three redfish, the first one was a beast and bent my hook, and as i was reeling the heavy spoon in and other hit and i fought him for ten minutes then he got off finally the last one hit right at the boat and he was on for about five minutes. Three bull reds on one cast and none landed. Would have sucked if I had not been catching them all afternoon. We finally just got tired of catching them and it was getting late, and my arm was starting to hurt. We were only boat out there. Really just wore us out. We did this all Summer to the point the charter boats started looking for us that year. I remember one day hearing them on the radio saying "damn that little boat has been on them all year on the radio." My fishing partner (Who is a priest now) and I fished at least a few times every week. Man I miss those days.

BTW, these guys in the video are too close, you want to be outside all the topwater action and be casting on the edge of it so your lure gets underneath all this. That is where the big ones are.

I have been dying to take my kids out and get on them one time. Thanks for posting that, brings back great memories.

Salt Life!

I saw this many years ago at Grand Isle. Fought one of these bulls for 45 min in the back bay until it straightened the hook on a redfish rig. There was also an extreme low tide that day and a bunch of redfish got trapped behind a sand bar by Elmers island. People were catching them with their bare hands, hay hooks, gaffs...anything that could snag a fish. It was crazy. There was also a hugh fish kill the next morning. It was nasty smelling by about noon.