Black Drum Fun on Aransas Bay
Gayne with a 26 inch black drum.
Morning came far too early for my friends Will Crowe, Joel O’Shoney, and me. The day before we had collectively landed four blacktip sharks (and lost another three) and we'd spent that night at Mickey's Bar & Grill in Aransas Pass celebrating. We'd eaten greasy bacon, jalapeno cheese fries, mounds of fried shrimp, and twists of calamari and washed it all down with beers aplenty. This extended period of voracious gluttony, combined with us having to rise long before dawn, had the three of us moving with the speed and enthusiasm of slugs.
We met Texas Bills & Gills Guide Service owner and operator Captain Dalton Cruse at Conn Brown Harbor at 5:45 AM. The launch was busy with dozens of trailered boats waiting to back into the bay. Dalton was already in the water and easy to find as he was standing aboard his 25 foot long, 8 1/2-foot-wide custom-built Diamondback Airboat painted in amazingly loud Day-Glo acid trip turquoise blue. Even in the dark, his boat looked and glowed like a neon beer sign. My friends and I climbed aboard, took hearing protection from the captain, and made ourselves ready by taking our places upon the blazing white faux alligator leather with turquois trimmed seats. Dalton fired up the boat’s 520 hp engine, brought the six carbon fiber blades to life, and gunned us forward…at a snail’s pace. But once we were out of the No Wake zone, he floored it, and we cut across the bay like the proverbial rocket out of hell. We continued to rocket through and around high marsh islands of black mangrove, marshhay cordgrass, sea ox-eye daisy, eastern Baccharis, and other vegetation I had no idea what it was until I got home and hit Google.
Captain Dalton found a shallow lake within these islands, brought his craft to a stop, and had us help him make ready. We each grabbed an 8-foot Coastal Medium Light rod strung with 30-pound test braid and hooked a dead shrimp onto the hook and tossed them in the shallows. The sun rose slowly in the east casting the bay and the tangle of scrub we sat within in shades of warm orange and apricot. Off the port side, a school of black drum tore through the shallows, their backs breaching the surface. We all thought for sure they’d be the first species to bite, but the 22-inch redfish I landed just before 7:00 had other ideas. He was followed by nice sized black drum Joel landed at 7:15, an even nicer black drum that Will landed at 7:27, and a hoss of a black drum that measured 26 inches in length that I pulled into the boat at 7:35. From then on it became a pattern of Gayne lands a black drum followed by Joel then Will then back to Gayne. Occasionally Captain Dalton would tear across the marsh to try a new honey hole, but the pattern continued until the three of us had our limit of five drum a piece. From that point on, our good captain tried focusing on redfish but as he explained, “It’s just not the right time of year for them in the bay.”
But try we did, and at just shortly after noon, Joel pulled in what would be our last fish and redfish of the day. We rocketed back to Conn Brown Harbor where Joel and I tore into celebratory beers and Captain Dalton handed our fish off to filet master Resha Durst. This old school pal of Dalton’s is a true ronin in that he’s a samurai with knives and serves no master other than the one who hires him. And as Dalton hired him, he showed up with knives and turned our catch of 17 fish into 34 filets sealed in plastic and on ice in no time flat. Will, Joel, and I thanked him, then Captain Dalton and drove our filth and sweat sheened covered bodies back to Mickey's Bar & Grill to celebrate another great day on the water.
Reach Captain Dalton Cruse HERE
This piece first appeared in the Fredericksburg Standard.
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