Rio Grande Early Summer: Trout & Reds on the Tide

This is Artificial Lure with your Rio Grande, Texas area fishing report. We’ve got classic early-summer conditions. National Weather Service Brownsville shows morning temps in the low 70s climbing into the upper 80s, light southeast wind around 8–14 knots, and only a slight chance of a stray shower this afternoon. Skies are partly cloudy, so you’ll get some sun but also decent sight-fishing windows. The breeze will pick up after lunch and stack a little chop on open water. According to tide tables for the lower Laguna Madre near Brazos Santiago Pass, we’re sitting on a modest tidal swing today: a predawn high, easing toward a late-morning low, then a slow rise through the afternoon. That means the **best water movement** is right around sunrise, and again on that early afternoon push. Low tide will drain some of those back flats and push bait off the edges. Sunrise is right around 6:35 a.m. with sunset near 8:25 p.m. Down here, that **first hour after sunrise** and the last 90 minutes of light are still the money windows, especially with the heat we’ve been stacking the last few days. Local reports from the lower Rio Grande and nearby lower Laguna Madre backwaters say **speckled trout** have been steady at first light on the shallow grass and potholes, with a mix of schoolie fish and some solid keepers. Redfish are cruising knee-deep flats and dropping off into guts once the sun gets up. Folks soaking bait off the channels and around the jetties have picked up some **black drum**, **mangrove snapper**, and the odd **slot snook** tight to structure. Inshore counts the last few days: small trout numbers are good, keeper ratios better on live bait and slowly worked soft plastics. Reds are not thick, but when you find them, they’re in small pods—two to five fish—tailing early or pushing wakes along the grass lines. Offshore-minded anglers hitting nearshore structure out of Brazos Santiago have found **king mackerel**, **snapper**, and a few **jack crevalle** when the wind allows. For lures, stick to what works local. Topwaters at gray light—**Super Spook Jr**, **Skitter Walk**, or a bone-colored walking plug—have been drawing blowups on the leeward shorelines and over skinny grass. Once the sun gets higher, switch to **soft plastics** on 1/8–1/16 oz jigheads: paddle-tails and straight tails in **white, opening night, glow/chartreuse, and new penny**. Work them slow with a twitch-twitch-pause along drains and sand pockets. For reds, a gold spoon or a small weedless paddle-tail sight-cast in front of cruising fish still does the job. If you’re fishing bait, **live shrimp** under a popping cork around channel edges, drop-offs, and spoil banks is hard to beat for trout, drum, and whatever else is home. Cut mullet or fresh-cut ladyfish on a Carolina rig will find reds and drum on the deeper edges and around the mouths of the Rio Grande and nearby sloughs. Keep leaders light and natural; this water runs clear when the wind backs off. A couple of local hot spots to consider: - **Boca Chica / Brazos Santiago jetties**: Work the channel edges at daybreak for trout and the occasional snook. Free-line live shrimp or small baitfish close to the rocks, or slow-roll a soft plastic along the drop. - **Lower flats east of the Rio Grande mouth toward South Bay**: On the falling tide, redfish and trout will slide off the ultra-shallow flats into the first gut. Drift quietly, fan-cast plastics, and watch for nervous bait and pushes. Overall fish activity today should bump up around that early moving tide and again on the afternoon rise. Midday will be slower and more of a grind—go deeper, lighter on the leader, and more subtle on the presentations. That’s your Rio Grande fishing report from Artificial Lure. Thanks for tuning in, and don’t forget to subscribe so you don’t miss the next one. This has been a quiet please production, for more check out quiet please dot ai. Great deals on fishing gear https://amzn.to/44gt1Pn