In 2019, Anglers Journal sent me to southern Louisiana to research and write a story about the fishing in, and the threats to, the Mississippi Delta. I was a guest of Huk Gear (that’s Huk’s Danny Carrier and Al Perkinson standing above. You’ll note my bull redfish is bigger than theirs) and we stayed at Cajun Fishing Adventures, a wonderful fishing lodge about 80 miles southeast of New Orleans. The fishing guides at CFA are some of the funniest and most environmentally informed people I’ve been around. And, the fishing for redfish and sea trout is terrific. The question is whether or not it all can hold together.

“What’s the biggest redfish you ever get?”

I carefully unclamp one hand from the rod grip and point a crooked finger at the sharply arced tip. “That would be the one at the end of my line right now,” I say to guide Todd Seither.

Everyone laughs, but the joke will be on me if I can’t keep this bull red from spitting the hook, here in Breton Sound about 70 miles south of New Orleans.

The laughter will come as often as the speckled trout and redfish on this August trip to the marshes and islands of the Mississippi River Delta, though the Cajuns and other Louisianans who live and work here have plenty of reason to weep. Hurricane Katrina passed right through here 14 years ago as it roared up the Gulf of Mexico on its catastrophic way to The Big Easy. The Deepwater Horizon drilling rig exploded and gushed more than 4 million barrels of oil into these fish-rich waters in 2010, just 60 miles from this spot. And there’s something else happening that threatens their way of life. But right now, only my reel is wailing because the big red I’m trying to bring in has seen the boat and is making other plans.

Eventually, Seither cleanly nets the fish, which tapes out at 40 inches. It will be one of about a dozen bulls the three of us catch and release that morning, even though Seither says the fishing is “a little slow.” The bulls are smacking Z-man Jerk Shadz 18 inches under popping corks, tossed out on 7 ½-foot spinning rods with 3000 series reels loaded with 30-pound braid. I know this because that first bull almost yanked the rod from my hands when it crushed the shrimp, and I wanted to know what I might have to replace if this fishing kept up.

Guide Joe DeMarco goes to work on a redfish at Cajun Fishing Adventures.

My fishing partners, Huk Gear’s Danny Carrier and Al Perkinson, high-five me. I’m grateful for their good company (and, to be honest, for the long-sleeved Icon X fishing hoodies they handed out, which prevented my northeast pallor from transforming into a hue resembling a Gulf of Mexico sunset. The guides loved them too).  At one point we have a triple bull hookup, and the photo of the three of us grinning and holding more than 50 pounds of redfish is now my screensaver.

I’ll meet other people on this trip who are doing more than saving photos of this place. They’re trying to save the place itself.

***

We’re at the fillet table at Cajun Fishing Adventures (cajunfishingadventures.com) lodge in Buras, Louisiana, our home for this three-day fishing trip. Two guides are filleting trout and redfish with electric Bubba fish fillet knives. Four other guides are walking around, cleaning up their boats and prepping for the next day, but stopping by the table occasionally. Everyone is drinking beer from cans. The ball-busting is nonstop.

A basket of slot redfish, ready to be turned into tasty fillets.

One guide is cutting up a redfish at the lower end of the 12- to 25-inch slot limit, and is paying for it. “Hey, you making a sandwich? Because that fish about as big as a slice of bread.”

Someone who was fishing near the river caught and kept a largemouth that wouldn’t break any records, which elicits helpful species identification. “You think that’s a bass? That’s not a bass. That’s a perch dressed up as a bass.”

Four cats within scrap-throwing distance are watching intently from the weeds behind the fillet table, but are careful to venture no closer. One of the guides tells me that Seithert once offered $100 to anyone who could catch one of the near-feral animals—an impossibility, to be sure—but the fact that he had waited for several beers to go down before putting forth the offer tells me plenty about this lodge. I take a sip from my own can and hope more guides show up.

A big man strides past the fillet table and into the long boat shed. “Look at this guy, walking around like he owns the place,” says one of the guides. The joke here is that the big guy does own the place.

(Read the rest here, titled “Balancing Act,” at Anglers Journal.)