So I'm headed down to take the family + Sister-in-Law (& nephews) to Goose Island at the end of May. I grew up saltwater fishing on the NorthEast coast. I know a bit about the Gulf and how to target various types due to some fishing in Florida gulf/coast but have never been to Texas coast as I just finally convinced my wife to let us do Ocean/beach camping (hoping to work her up slowly to camping on the actual beach instead of the Bay).

I'm looking for suggestions - Plan is for shore, pier, and kayak fish in and around Goose Island - what is good to target this time of year around Goose Island? Any suggestions/experience on timing for good fishing (i noticed the tides are fairly small in the area - how much of a difference do they make?)

If anyone knows any really good kayaking spots in that area I'd love to hear about them. I'm planning, weather permitting, to try and kayak out to east pocket/blackjack point at least one day. Probably kayak around the chain of islands between goose island and there some of the other days (if the boat traffic/wind isn't dangerous)

Thanks for any info in advance!

PM sent.

If you want to know what a proper gaming area looks like on the middle coast, this is it. Broken up grass with potholes are your targets.

The state park has a fishing pier. For kayaks the best areas are on in the east side (which is St Charles bay). Be careful crossing the opening of St Charles bay. It gets choppy in a hurry from SE winds and there is typically a good amount of boat traffic entering and leaving St Charles bay. On the road that goes to the big live oak there’s a place to launch a kayak (on the west side of St Charles bay). You can launch there and head north up the bay and work the edges and back lakes from there. Be careful especially wading as St Charles has a decent gator population.

In terms of the tides yeah there’s not a ton of movement. Incoming tide early can be good. For reds main thing is to have movement one way or another.

I would be prepared to fish the grassy areas and or the sand potholes as shown above by Pat. There are some scattered oysters around too.

Thanks for the advice and the tips! Hopefully weather cooperates so I can get myself and the others with us on some nice fish over the days we are there.

It has been years since I fished Goose, so conditions may have changed a lot. But back then I would start at Stinky Beach. I would wade to about knee deep before fishing, in order to determine the sand ripple depths. Generally I would fish deeper pockets, which often would be no more than 6" to a foot deeper than the surrounding sand, but would make a world of difference in the bite. Early morning and late afternoon was best for short water. Once the sun came up, about 9 or 10, I would go deeper, above the belt line. Always looking for movement, other than the normal acrobatic mullet, and the shell reef that was there. Back then I fished almost exclusively with live shrimp, mullet or pin/piggys. My go to rig was a mauler with 1 or 2 buckshot weights crimped TO THE BOTTOM of the mauler wire. Adjust the weight so the mauler would "stand" in the water. From there I would attach an 18", or so after the hook is tied on, length of #20 Mason Hard leader material and a an Eagle Claw spinner bait trailer hook, 1/0 for shrimp and pins, 2/0 for mullet. Spinner bait hooks are very light and allow the bait to swim naturally. However, I have literally had a few bitten completely through by big sheep's head on rare occasions.
Not sure how it is now, but 10-15 years ago, Goose rarely disappointed. It was where I caught many 24-26" reds and Stinky still holds the speck record of my pb speck, a 28" lady I caught and released.

Be prepared for the most mosquitoes you have ever seen. We caught trout under the lights on small crappie jig and small spinners. We also used pink swim baits real smal!. I used a crappie rod under the lights and had a blast. Founded the go bridge headed to rock port. Throw live shrimp close to the pilots and you will wear out the sheaphead.

Thanks for the tip Texasredneck70 - I almost always have small crappie jigs with me - was going to leave them this time - but hearing this - will keep them around. I have 6 kids and 6+ adults who want to fish - and I'm bringing all the gear - not all want to deal with live bait (or with "fishing" - they just want "catching") so if the live bait is slow, crabbing or cast-netting is out (as they usually like to play with bait - with benefit of it being bait for those who are fishing) I can send the impatient ones jigging (since i'll cry less if i loose a jig compared to spoons or spinner bait)

Driving home from Corpus yesterday, the whole bay was green. That is green light city.