A Native-Born Charter Guide in the Making

A Little Something About Our Captain/Guide

In 2004, I joined a church and met an amazing pastor who happened to be a charter captain as well. On my seven days off of work, I ran charter fishing with him. I, first of all, built a relationship with God and from there this charter fishing business unfolded ever since. 

I got a boat, and my pastor, Jesse Morris, taught me everything there is to know about charter fishing. Along with the knowledge I gained from my grandfather, I’ve been charter fishing out of Venice, Louisiana for about 17 years now. I fished with Jesse with Cajun Unlimited for quite a few years and then started my own business called Southern Access Charters a few years ago.

We all still fish together and help each other out even with our separate businesses.

In the beginning stages of charter fishing, it took a lot of time and effort to figure out each species of fish - all the hows, when, and where. And later on in the business, I had to figure out how to get a deck load of a variety of fish. Timing and skills are of the essence.

Everything Has an Art to It

My story began at an early age. With the loss of my biological father and my mother having to work, I was raised by my grandparents at age five. My grandfather had me sitting on his commercial fishing boat every day. He would give me a pole and a bag of bread.

He would challenge me to roll the bread in tiny tight pieces and put it on a perch hook and try to catch the mullet that swam by the boat. I figured out at age five how to catch them. A five-gallon bucket of mullet per day and my grandfather would take me to the nearest bait shop. I would get fifty cents per pound.

My grandfather was a commercial fisherman who targeted pompano, sharks, shrimp, and redfish for a living. He taught me how to earn a living early, as well as how the fish worked with the tides, winds, cool fronts before and after. This was where my journey began in learning and experiencing the water and running boats. I went to school, while also making a living from commercial fishing on my grandfather’s boat.  I saw incredible sights of massive schools of various fish that my school friends had never seen at the ages of twelve to sixteen. I then graduated from high school and when I was 18, I married my high school girlfriend. We tagged teamed making extras sowing nets together for area commercial fishermen. 

This all came to an end in the late 1990s when big laws were enforced on the commercial industry. This veered me into getting a land job with an oil company.

For ten years, it was like making a living in prison because I was far from the water.

My story circles back to me meeting Pastor Jesse Morris in 2004. I finally found out the real meaning and purpose of all the past negative experiences I had.

Where I Love to Fish and Some Techniques I Use

I love fishing all the passes of the Mississippi delta, rock jetties, marshes, beaches, rivers, bays, nearshore and offshore oil rigs, wrecks, and reefs of the Gulf of Mexico. Redfish is the main targeted species out of Venice. However, there is such a variety of fish that there are many more to targets such as speckled trout, flounder, drumfish, sheepshead, mangrove, lane snapper, red snapper, tripletail, cobia, sharks, crevalle Jack, pompano, and Spanish mackerel.

The main fishing technique for all these fish can vary from Carolina rigs, jigheads bottom fishing, and popping corks with Carolina rigs or jigheads. Popping cork with a heavy leader with a jighead and artificial baits for schools of bull red action is ideal. Light leader and live shrimp for speckled trout action on a popping cork are great as well.

The equipment I count on the toughest elements as for rods and reels are Ugly sticks intercostal, Daiwa BG 4000, and the new Penn Conflict ll, big cat braid 50-80 lb fluorocarbon leader.

As for baits, live bait is a must during spring up until the fall. Dead bait (shrimp) is great during the winter months.

Timing is so critical in catching multiple species. It’s a decision in knowing whether to stay or make a move. You have to have patience! 

My favorite fishing technique is rig fishing. There is such a variety of fish out at the rigs. Customers never know what they are going to catch. And big red snapper and tripletail can be a big challenge when they take your line into the rig and you have to learn how to finesse them out without a break-off.

An Unforgettable Charter Fishing Service

My favorite charter fishing service happened about three years ago. Wayne, his son, and his dad popped in from Florida and went for a full-day fishing trip out in Breton sound with me. We came across schools of bull reds that had the water red and exploding for half a mile. We used jigheads, lures, popping corks… you name it! These redfish were on fire. All 25-35 pound average redfish mixed with crevalle Jack and sharks. We caught and released over 50 redfish, multiple jacks, and sharks, not to mention several 40-50 lb black drum. We also caught all the sheepshead we could handle at the nearby shallow rigs.

That was a day with incredible footage and you can find it on my website. His boy was 15 at the time and that’s something he will never forget.

My best catch story would be limiting out on a four-man limit of one hundred speckled trout, a four-man limit of redfish of twenty, over forty sheepshead, limited out on nice red snapper of eight, drumfish, and tripletail all in one trip. But don’t get me wrong, I’ve also had many close experiences with other species. 

Every fishing trip is like my first. I can’t explain the excitement I get when customers fill the fish box with a variety of fish. When they experience the Mississippi delta that takes them into the Gulf of Mexico, it’s an adventure they never forget. I get customers from Texas and Florida and they are repeat customers that tell me there isn’t another place that holds as much of a variety of fish as Venice, LA.

This is an incredible place!