Fishing is still as good as ever, but East Cut is in dire straits

By David Sikes (Contact)
Sunday, May 25, 2008

Port Mansfield

PORT MANSFIELD -- Little has changed since my previous visit to this community where anglers come for some of the best shallow water fishing anywhere.

Angling opportunities still abound here and the nearby, shrinking, gulf pass still is threatening to limit its glory.

Count me among the residents, visitors and guides of Port Mansfield who are struggling to figure out how to maintain a viable flow through what the locals call the East Cut. Others know it as the Mansfield Channel and anyone who fishes here refers to as the ecological and economic lifeblood of Port Mansfield. By any name, this cut through Padre Island is filling with sand because of apathy and neglect.

Everyone knows its expensive to scoop sand from a gulf pass over and over again. But we're not so sure about the price we'd pay for a closed pass.

For years the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers accepted the job as its responsibility. But no more.

Corps officials tell me they simply cannot afford to maintain a channel that doesn't benefit a commercial port, which is one of the Corps primary duties.

It's unclear why this position wasn't adopted until recently. Port Mansfield has never been much more than a recreational harbor or port of refuge. And yet the Corps installed the jetties and had been maintaining the pass since the 1960s.

The East Cut certainly provides more than small craft access for the Lower Laguna Madre. The lack of commercial tonnage notwithstanding we know that such passes, whether man made or natural, benefit the rich ecosystems they feed.

The Mansfield Channel is the only gulf pass between Corpus Christi and South Padre Island. And because the spawning habits of many coastal species rely on access to the gulf, most biologists agree that a pass within proximity creates a more vibrant and resilient ecosystem and certainly would sustain greater populations of the fishes we enjoy.

Allowing this section of the Lower Laguna to go barren would be irresponsible. And neglecting it because Port Mansfield lacks the maritime commerce or political clout certainly is unfair.

In speaking with local officials and politicians, it's clear that on its own Willacy County doesn't have the political muscle in Austin or Washington to garner legislative support for this project. Corps officials said the most recent estimates called for removing 400,000 to 500,000 cubic yards of sediment from the Mansfield Channel. To do it right, the total one-time dredging cost would be about $10.2 million.

The Willacy County Navigation District several years ago embarked on a measure to help themselves by leasing and later purchasing a small floating dredge machine to maintain a length of channel from the inside of the East Cut to the port itself. But this device lacks the seaworthiness to tackle the bigger job of dredging the East Cut itself.

Port Director Mike Wilson said Willacy County Commissioners voted to award the project nearly $500,000 in federal grant money for each of the past couple years. Wilson remains confident commissioners will do the same in 2009 and 2010. And he believes he can make this money last through 2012. But again, this is not for the East Cut dredging.

Currently, a limited amount of seawater is passing through this jettied pass, but only the northern side of the channel is deep enough for some offshore boats. Many blue-water vessels no longer are moored at Port Mansfield because of future uncertainty. And sailboat captains navigate the pass at their peril.

This section of the Lower Laguna Madre remains a premier bay-fishing destination. Longtime guide, Tricia "Capt. Trish" Buchen, said she and her charter partner, Mike McBride, continue to enjoy catch rates similar to what they've grown accustomed to over the years.

And because Port Mansfield's image is that of a big-trout and redfish spot for lure anglers and fly casters, locals I spoke with don't believe that recently tightened trout regulations have had much negative impact on visitation. Catch and release is part of the culture here and most anglers come for quality rather than quantity, the guides tell me.

Texas Parks & Wildlife reduced the daily trout limit in the Lower Laguna Madre from 10 to five fish, citing a slight drop in big-trout numbers. For all other coastal waters in Texas the limit remains at 10 trout per day per angler.

TPW officials blame harvest pressure for the population dip. Biologists eliminated the shrinking East Cut as a possible explanation. They were convinced of this, in part, because they saw no similar decline in other fish species within the Lower Laguna Madre. Makes sense to me.

But few people doubt that a completely closed pass would hurt fishing in nearby waters. We should soon know more about this estuary's dependence on a sustained pass to the Gulf of Mexico, thanks to a study funded by Coastal Conservation Association-Texas and conducted by fisheries biologist Greg Stunz with the Harte Research Institute for Gulf of Mexico Studies at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi.

This study also could provide insight on fish movements and tell us whether tide-runner trout from the gulf mingle with trout in our bays. But if folks are searching for certainty before they react to the East Cut problem, that's not going to happen. The only way to arrive at a cause-and-effect conclusion would be to measure the long term effects of a closed pass after the fact. And by then it would be too late.

Our only hope is to make folks understand the great value of Port Mansfield and of that section Lower Laguna Madre. If we accomplish this then surely fewer folks would be so willing to risk losing the resource.

The U.S. Fish & Widlife Service and TPW, as resource protection agencies, should be allowed to lobby legislators on behalf of the Lower Laguna Madre to garner attention and funding.

We can assume that at some point, more and more people will be looking for remote places with uncrowded recreational opportunities. I hope by the time they reach Port Mansfield that the natural inhabitants have not abandoned the bays there.

David Sikes' Outdoors column runs Thursday and Sunday. Contact David at 886-3616 or sikesd@caller.com.