ew: I still have two things on my list: Catch a Redfish on my flyrod. I'm working on that. And, Buy a winning Lottery ticket. I don't need the hundreds of millions. One would last me till I check out, and probably leave a bit for my spouse and a very few others. Life doesn't owe me anything. TexasJim

Well dang Jim,
We can do the first for sure. I can put you on them, but I haven't used a fly rod in forever, so that parts up to you.

I can put him on a flyrod red. The first time he went with me, last winter, he didn't use a fly rod. We saw a lot of reds in North Cullen but they weren't eating craft fur, or the plastic he was throwing. The last time we had a stout north wind and high chocolate milk water to contend with. We hit the sands, North Cullen, Parker's Creek, and perused several spots in between. The only clear water we found was devoid of fish, and the few fish we saw in the brown water were all big uglies -- laughing at us. We might have caught some with conventional gear and a split crab, but we were chucking craft fur with fly rods, and big uglies don't eat flies very often. I caught a 33 1/4" big ugly on my two weight back in July, fishing a little #6 Clouser for specks at East Cut. It was hooked up on the roof of it's mouth; it ate the fly. A friend of mine caught a 45" big ugly on a Clouser with his 7 weight a few years ago; he won the black drum division of the Laguna Madre Fly Fishing Association's annual members' tournament with it. I've caught a lot of puppy drum on shrimp patterns and crab patterns, but the overslots are rare on flies.

Those biguns do show up in some baffling places. When one thumps your jig you do think you’ve hooked a serious red. Then it just starts moving like a Mack truck and the mystery ends.