BIG LAKE Water conditions on Big Lake are about as good as they can get with fishable water conditions from The Weirs, West Cove, Heberts, Turners and all the way to Prien and Lake Charles. Anglers are catching fish in all of these areas as water temperatures are 73/74 degrees which is close to ideal. Lake Charles pro angler, David Rabalais, fished all weekend and stated that birds were working everywhere he fished which included Turners Bay area all the way to the southeast bank.
He also mentioned Black Lake as being very productive. In working the birds, Rabalais said there were a lot of sand trout working the birds and the specs seemed to be in the upper layer of water and the sand trout close to the bottom. They were working their lures a couple of feet below the surface to stay away from sand trout. However, he found that after the birds left you could hang around the area for a few minutes and watch for shrimp to surface and then work the shrimp to catch some additional nice trout. Don't leave too quickly.
Bill Dance, famous bass angler/t.v. personality, has a saying, "Don't leave fish to go look for fish". That certainly could apply to these schools of quality trout. The topwater bite is improving as trout are beginning to move to the hard/sandy bottom areas such as Long Point as well as others. Red fish are still in big numbers with The Weirs (Lambert and Grand Bayou) still cranking out super catches with lots of fish inside the edge of the marsh above the weirs.
Rabalais said they were using Berkley Gulp! with 3-4 inch Gulp! Shrimp and Swimming Mullet. Top colors included New Penny, Natural Shrimp, Black/chartreuse and Nuclear Chicken. Calcasieu Point's, Elaine Huck, is still singing her favorite song...."Can hardly believe it but the fishing is still fantastic." Her reports indicate that Turners is the hottest area but Prien Lake, Moss lake and Four Corners are also producing extremely well.
Reports from West Cove has flounder fishing to be quite good. Huck states that The Weirs may have slowed down slightly but with a moving tide you can get a limit of reds with little trouble
