San Marcos — I've wanted to get to the coast for some spring fishing for several weeks but the world-class bass fishing that we have been experiencing on Lake Bastrop with our fly rods has kept me busy.

But the 25th Annual Rockport-Fulton Spring Fling early this week lured me to our lovely Third Coast. My wife Beth and I have attended this Chamber of Commerce sponsored fishing, eating and birding extravaganza for over 20 years. Actually, I received an award at the big Rockport Country Club banquet Sunday night for attending the most consecutive Spring Flings.

It's always a fun event. Outdoor media friends and fishing tackle representatives from all over our state gather for two days of fun and reunion.

Even our own Daily Record Sports Editor Randy Stevens and his wife made the fun trip this year. It was his wife’s first visit, and he says she had a really great time just relaxing even though she didn’t feel up to fishing.

On Monday, local guides took all the writers and tackle manufacturers out to sample the fishing on San Antonio, St. Charles, Aransas, Redfish and Corpus Christi bays. The Rockport area is not short on water.

Having fished with dozens of the Rockport fishing guides through the years I always enjoy observing the skills of a different guide. This year Capt. Ed Zielinski, who guides both in the bays and offshore in the Gulf, was my man.

Glynn Walling and Lane Teykl of Midcoast Products joined us. They manufacture some innovative poppin’ floats under the slogan “Improving the Way you Fish.”

Also in the boat with us was San Antonio Express-News journalist Ralph Winningham.

They're not many fishing holes in the Rockport area that I haven’t visited with a rod and reel. But Monday was a new game.

“This little cold front has cooled the shallow flats,” our guide said. “So I plan to start on some deep water gas wells in the middle of Aransas Bat. We can hit the skinny water later when it warms up.”

I fish the oil and gas wells in Corpus Bay regularly but never had tried any Aransas Bay wells. So this was a first.

Zielinski is a real piece of work. He grew up in Austin where he earned a Ph.D. from The University of Texas in fisheries biology. Thus, the name of his charter service — Doctors Orders. His doctoral work was done on Redfish Bay studying sea grasses and mangrove bushes, After 25 years in academia teaching marine biology in universities across America, he finally returned to the bays he loves to guide fishermen full time. The guy is like having a biological encyclopedia in the boat.

The only problem with fishing wells in open water was the wind. The ride to the middle of Aransas Bay was a bit wet in a flats boat.

The first gas platform didn’t pay off, so Ed motored us to another one. Everyone on the boat was fishing live shrimp near the bottom in 10-feet of water, except me. I didn't care to fish with bait so I was casting a Gulp plastic shrimp.

On about my third cast, the lure stopped. When I set the hook, we all knew it was a big fish. He doubled over my rod and began a tug-of-war trying to get under the well. As the rod throbbed and I pumped, Ed began to guess what we had on the line.

“Maybe a big trout,” he guessed. “He's shaking his head like a trout.”

After about five minutes of battle I said, “If this is a trout, he’s staying deep and will be the world record.”

I knew it couldn't be a trout and probably not a redfish. He didn’t make any long, fast strong runs. It was just a powerful slug out.

“Maybe a black drum,” surmised the guide. “Or a big sheepshead,” I added.

It was just wait and see.

The fish slowly tired and neared the boat. Now at last, on the surface we could see his stripes. It was a nice black drum. Ed lifted the fish in the net into the boat just as the weight of the drum ripped the net to pieces.

While I was removing the hook from my drum one of the Midcoast Product boys hooked into a nice trout. Soon a three-pounder was flopping on the deck with my drum.

The drum measured 28 inches. Drum between 14 and 30 inches may be retained — all others released. So we dropped all 12 pounds of my fish into the icebox.

Black drum rarely hit a lure, but they will bite a Gulp because of the scent.

On the next well, the other tackle manufacturer, Teykl, caught another keeper trout. And then the bite shut down.

We eventually moved to shallow water but only skipjacks, hard heads, pinfish and eels liked our offerings.

But I didn't mind the slow bite. I just enjoyed listening to Ed. I was learning.

“You see all these black mangrove bushes?” he asked. “Our genetic research showed that they are the same as mangrove trees all over the world. In other environments they grow big. They become trees. But here, only bushes, because this is the most northern part of their range. Too cool to grow big.”

I did know that our mangrove bushes are on about a 20-year cycle. About every 20 years, a fish killing freeze also kills the mangrove back to the roots. Then they slowly recover.

For Aransas mangroves they're big now. How long will it be before they start over?

As for Randy, he reported catching numerous trout with Chris Fortin of Play’n Hooky Charters, but most weren’t keepers. He did however pull in a nice-sized gaffe-head catfish that gave him a really good fight.

He also said he was excited to find two crabs when he hooked onto the rope of an unmarked crab trap. One was a blue crab, the other a stone crab which Randy said had a stubborn temper he really admired.

Randy and his group fished Copana Bay, an area Chris is especially familiar with.

For a fun, fish-catching, educational trip with Doctor’s Orders Charter and Capt. Ed Zielinski.  Call 361-463-8667 or to fish with or duck hunt with Chris and Play’n Hooky Charters call (512) 216-1621.

Jim Darnell is an ordained minster and host of the syndicated outdoors show, “God’s Great Outdoors.” his column appears every Thursday in the Daily Record.