The big boats gather at Cypress Cove this morning. The New Orleans Big Game Fishing Club's invitational, the one we've had on the calendar since July, runs today through Saturday: captains meeting tonight, fishing Friday and Saturday, scales open until 7 both evenings.

It's the final leg of the Louisiana Champions Cup, and the Gulf is cooperating, west wind laying down every afternoon and the tropics forecast quiet for the next week. If you've never watched a blue marlin come to a scale, drive down. That part costs nothing.

Redfish and black drum. The freshest dated receipts this week come off FishingBooker, where Cajun Culture's Capt. Herman Demoll posted five reports between August 11 and 17: redfish limits on the 11th and 13th, steady reds and drum through the weekend, and Monday's trip "all 25 inch reds and bigger" with a flounder and a drum in the box. His words on Saturday's bite: "amazing." The slot is four fish between eighteen and twenty-seven inches, nothing over twenty-seven, so those 25-inchers are right against the top of it. Measure.

Speckled trout. Reel Shot is still at it, and yes, that's the fourth issue running they've earned a line: Capt. Jon Carter posted limits of trout and reds by 9 a.m. Monday, then "double limits by 9 am" again Tuesday. The river backs him up: the gauge at Venice has fallen steadily for two weeks toward its annual floor, and that clean low water is the setup every fall trout pattern down here is built on. Fifteen fish at thirteen inches, no more than two over twenty.

Mangrove snapper. Still the bottom trip while red snapper stays shut. Twelve inch minimum, ten per person inside the ten-snapper aggregate, no more than five mutton in the mix.

Red snapper. Closed since August 9, and the reopen question got its first real answer this week. More on that below, because LDWF said it out loud.

Yellowfin, wahoo, mahi. No captain posted a fresh dock report this week, but when an angler asked the groups Monday where the yellowfin have been, the thread gave an honest answer: only small fish at the nearer spots, Elf, Who Dat and Tinker as of Friday, and the better word from way out at the Green Canyon platforms, 90-some miles, where the fish have been there at night but the sharks are taxing them. Take that as marsh-telegraph, not gospel. The tournament fleet leaves Cypress Cove Thursday to chase exactly these fish, and the scales Friday and Saturday will tell us more than any secondhand post could.

Amberjack. Opens September 1, one fish per person at a thirty-four inch fork minimum. And a correction from last week: I printed October 31 as the close. The date that matters is October 14, when federal waters shut at 12:01 a.m., and LDWF's own page now prints October 14. State water inside nine miles technically runs to Halloween, but almost nobody catches an AJ inside nine miles. Put October 14 on the calendar. Gag grouper opens the same day amberjack does, September 1, so the fall bottom calendar stacks up fast.

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Start with the tournament, because it's the closest thing to live coverage a weekly gets: this issue lands the morning the New Orleans Invitational starts. Blue marlin, tuna, wahoo and dolphin are the categories, Cypress Cove is the host, and the weigh-ins run through 7 p.m. Friday and Saturday with awards Saturday night. It's the last leg of the Champions Cup, so crews chasing series points have every reason to fish hard. Full results land in next week's issue.

Now the snapper math, because LDWF finally put a voice on it. Assistant Secretary Ryan Montague told Louisiana Radio Network on Monday: "Our hope is that we are able to reopen the season and allow fishing through Labor Day Weekend." He also gave the running total: "We still had a 101-day season, and we've caught close to 882,000 pounds of fish." The newest published estimate on LDWF's snapper page says 789,300 pounds through July 26, which is 89.5 percent of the allocation, up ten points in a single estimated week. That's why they closed it, and it's also why a reopen is genuinely possible: the question is only whether the last unprocessed weeks of data left any room.

So here's the practical version. A reopen is hoped for, not announced. If it comes, it'll come on short notice, aimed at Labor Day weekend, the same way the closure came. Holding a September bottom trip? Watch LDWF's news page, not your group chat. Holding an August trip? It's a mangrove and marsh trip, and the marsh is fishing well.

Southern Addiction Outfitters, Capt. Bryan Marshall. The week the offshore fleet is busy with a tournament is a good week to point you inshore. Marshall has been guiding out of Venice for over 24 years by the state charter association's listing, and he runs a 24-foot Triton bay boat out of Venice Marina at 237 Sports Marina Road, working the bayous and bays for the same reds and drum filling the reports above, plus trout, tripletail and mangroves when the water calls for it. His own site lists seasonal snapper and amberjack runs too, which matters with September 1 coming. His Captain Experiences listing is new, no reviews on it yet; the operation itself is anything but. Through the link below the trip is a flat $1,000 for up to four people. Booking direct runs $900 to $1,200 plus fuel depending on party size, so compare and take the door that fits your crew.

Check dates, flat $1,000 for up to 4 anglers: Book Southern Addiction through Captain Experiences

(We earn a small commission if you book through this link, at no extra cost to you. It keeps this report free.)

Non-stainless circle hooks. Nobody brags about their hook box, but here's the regulation most weekend bottom boats miss: when you're fishing natural bait for reef fish in Gulf federal waters, non-stainless steel circle hooks are required gear, per the 2026 LDWF pamphlet, along with a dehooking device. That covers your mangrove trip right now and your amberjack and gag trips on September 1. The non-stainless part is the point: a hook that stays in a broken-off fish needs to rust out, and stainless doesn't. A pack of 8/0 to 10/0 non-offset circles costs less than a bag of ice and keeps a $1,500 trip legal. Check the box before the opener, because the tackle shop in Venice at 5 a.m. will be out.

West wind is the whole forecast. NWS out of Slidell has it 10 to 15 knots early each day, dropping to 5 to 10 by afternoon, with seas around 2 feet in the mornings and a foot or less Friday and Saturday afternoons. Showers and storms ride mainly in the mornings Friday and Saturday, so the standing caveat about winds and seas near thunderstorms earns its keep this week. No small craft advisories anywhere in it, and the hurricane center expects no tropical development for the next seven days.

The tide came back from the dead. After last week's neap, Pilottown swings about a foot every day of the window: morning high around 4 to 7 a.m., then one long fall into the evening. Moon's at first quarter Wednesday night, building toward full on the 28th, so the ranges keep growing into next week.

Water's still holding 87 to 88 on the daily average at Southwest Pass, so the heat rules haven't changed: fish the morning, respect the afternoon.

Read it this way: offshore is fishable all four days, and Friday and Saturday afternoons are the flattest water of the window if you can dodge the morning storms. Inshore, ride the falling tide from mid-morning on, and let the west wind pick your bank: fish the lee.

Flounder gets a hard stop this fall. Southern flounder is ten per person daily with no size limit right now, and then there's no possession at all from October 15 through November 30, closed both to rods and gigs. The fall run at the passes peaks right as that window slams, so if a flounder box is part of why you're coming down, come before October 15 or wait until December.

The water's back on down the road. A pressure loss put a precautionary boil water advisory on everything from the Port Sulphur water plant south to Venice on Saturday. Plaquemines Parish Councilman Mitch Jurisich posted Sunday morning that the advisory is lifted. If you're heading down this weekend, the taps and the ice machines are back to normal.

Whales off South Pass. An angler in one of the Louisiana groups posted video of a pair of dwarf sperm whales blowing about 20 miles out of South Pass, spotted Saturday and again Sunday, a week after his crew ran across a much bigger sperm whale 35 miles out. The delta drops into deep water faster than almost anywhere in the Gulf, and every so often it sends up a reminder.

The Empire tarpon rodeo board never surfaced. Three weeks since the scales closed and the Champions Cup page still shows no 2026 results. We said we'd run them when they posted; if they ever do, we will, and that's the last you'll hear of it otherwise.

If you make it to the Cypress Cove scales Friday or Saturday, hit reply and tell me what you saw come off the boats. Next week's issue runs the board, and a reader who was standing at the rail beats a results page every time.

Joey

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