Friends of Padre: Reports

Driving is fine on low tide but there are some really soft areas (esp. Big Shell) on high tides. Water color varies from beautiful to murky in various locations for the entire beach front. No new sargassum was seen altho old weed is present high up on the tide line. The beach is eroded significantly at the 52 and 58 mile and care must be taken when traveling in these areas. Some birds were seen working but no fish other than a few small hardhead catfish were observed. North end is crowded with campers; few visitors in Big Shell or south of Big Shell. Bird numbers is increasing. 193 Great Blue Herons were observed including individual groups of 43, 19, 37, 24, 36 and 23. This is quite unusual. Other bird species include 3 Golden Plover, 3 White-tailed hawks, 1 Peregrine, 1 Merlin, 1 Yellow Crowned Night Heron, 500 White Egrets sp., 8 Curlew, 3 White tailed hawks and 2 Caracara. Willets are staging in large flocks. A beach cleanup is being held out of Port Mansfield on Sat. 15 March and everyone is invited to participate. A group will be leaving ranger headquarters at 6:45 a. m. for those with 4 wheel drive vehicles.

FoP Trip 3-7-14 Air Temp: 61 degrees Water Temp: 57 degrees Wave height: 2 feet No new weed, some dead weed in the guts on the bottom. Water dirty to the second sandbar, only went to the 52mm because the driving got way too skinny. Best looking section of the beach was between the blacktop and 7mm Not a huge plethora of species of birds, most just the usual. Did see a few Caracaras, one Night Heron, two American Avocets, one cattle egret, many Curlews/Royal Terns, Forster’s Terns.

FOP REPORT 021614 by board member Jeff Wolda Air Temp: 65 Water Temp: 55 Wind: 5-15 SE Waves: 2-3 Water Clarity: Clear length of beach Weed: None Driving: Excellent Hit the beach again today with fellow board member Tyler Thorsen. We had great conditions with the exception of, still no bait in the water. Gulls are still feeding on small hard heads the length of the beach. We threw lures again today looking for trout with no luck. Until the bait moves back in and the water warms up a tad fishing with lures will be tough. As we hit the beach this morning we did see a rare sight, approximately 20 white pelicans were in the surf in the 2nd gut at the 1mm. After hitting the jetties and heading back north, we stopped and fished a hole at the 48. Getting back into the truck I realized we had a leak in the left front tire. I want to thank Kevin and friends from Hondo and Doug from San Antonio in the yellow jeep who was our wing man as we left the beach. Thanks also to ranger Van Aaltz who let us air up our ailing tire at the ranger center. Good folks that will be paid back forward!

Jeff Wolda filed this report: Air Temp: 59 Water Temp: 51 Wind: 5-10 NE Waves: 2-3 ft Water Clarity: Clear the length of the beach Weed: None Driving: Excellent at low tide, some 4x4 at high tide Went to the jetties and back with fellow board member Tyler Thorsen. Best water I’ve seen all winter as far as clarity. Threw lures all day looking for trout without a bump. We did see one camp in Big Shell with a black drum on the beach. Only fish we saw all day. Zero bait in the water. 13 Curlew, 1 White Tailed Hawk, 1 Caracara and 5 white tailed deer. A dead dolphin at the 17.5 mile mark and a look at Big Shell as the tide came in.

Driving was good the entire length of the beach front. Water was murky inshore the Northern 54 miles and green the Southern 6 miles. Very little feeding activity was observed and this was restricted to small Terns. No fish activity was observed. Some sargassum entangled in yellow whip coral was observed in the Little Shell while the remainder of the beach was weed free. Some wildlife was observed. Royal, Caspian and Foresters Terns were observed along with a min. of shorebirds and larger species of gulls. 29 Long Billed Curlews were observed. Beach combing was fair with very high numbers of starfish and Angel Wings on the south end of the beach. Water was cold. Water was attempting to clear but will not have necessary time to do so before the arrival of the next cold frontal passage. A merlin enjoying the afternoon. Dead Sea Turtle

Air Temp: 73 Water Temp: 71 Wind: 10 SE Waves: 3-4 ft Water Clarity: Dirty out to 3rd bar Weed: Only weed on beach was at the 17, covered about ¾ of a mile. Plenty of bait in the water with finger mullet in the first gut the length of the beach. Atlantic spots were in the 50’s and getting hammered by fish and birds. With no weed in the water, soaking bait was easy and produced all day. Fishing the last week has been some of the best of the year for Reds and Jacks. Thursday it peaked with 35 reds with only 4 in the slot and the rest bulls, along with 23 large jacks. Driving is excellent except during peak high tide. The beach is getting VERY skinny from the 53 to the 58.5. Getting to the jetty is only possible at low tide unless you drive through the water. Very few birds on the beach with the exception of the Brown pelicans getting fat for the winter on all the migrating finger mullet. This recent cold front will change everything on the beach. Water temperatures have dropped from 71 to 62 as of this morning. They will continue to drop with the cold temps forecasted for the remainder of the week. This should end the mullet migration and the winter fishing pattern should fall into place.

This report is a combined effort by Friends of Padre and Sharkathon to inspect the beach for trash and fish remains after a long tournament weekend. Water clarity improved Monday, October 28th after strong winds and high water pounded the seashore on Friday and Saturday. Small pieces of sargassum were making landfall on the southern half of the beach, but no substantial mats were reported. Dead sargassum returned to the wade gut and first bar due to Saturday's high water event. No actively feeding birds were observed until reaching the East cut, where brown pelicans and laughing gulls were feeding over skipjack, Spanish mackerel, and blacktip sharks. The observed prey in the wash at the foot of the jetty was a mixture of finger mullet and anchovies. Larger boils were observed at the end of jetty, but a positive identification was unavailable. The water in the East Cut was green to brown in color. This tannin-stained water can be observed at passes following high rain events when slugs of freshwater exit the estuaries. Our bird count was incomplete as our eyes were focused on trash and fish remains. With that said, two Peregrine falcons were observed and 14 Long -billed Curlews were counted.

Water is clear the entire length of the beach but Sargassum owns it from one end to the other. Large mats still coming in are visible in most areas. A few jack Crevalle, Spanish Mackerel and redfish are available in small areas but it is a hard grind with the weed and most of the beach is unfishable. The beach is hard packed and driving is good although weed covers much of the beach front and traveling on high tide is tough. Only about one mile North of the Port Mansfield jetties is clear of grass. Finger mullet are scattered. I have never seen the grass this bad at this time of year and my impression is it isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. Birds were hard to observe in the cloudy conditions and with all the Sargassum but my count came up to 1,360 Red Knots (probably this is less than were actually present), 30 Long Billed Curlews, 5 Peregrine Falcons, 1 Merlin and 2 Caracara.