Port Aransas Collecting Trip

[rwilliams26]

After the MAAST trip to Corpus was cancelled, my wife and I decided to keep our reservations out at Port A. anyway and get away for a nice weekend, and see if we could do some rookie "collecting" while there. We drove down from Round Rock Friday afternoon and came home last night. The trip was great! :grin:

The weather was absolutely wonderful. There WAS lots of seweed along the beach on Friday and Saturday, but by yesterday morning the water was much clearer. It was obvious that the storm had churned things up in the Gulf, but we think that might have been one of the reasons we ended up doing so well collecting!

We bought a battery powered aeration system and a couple of nets at Academy before we left, and it's a good thing we did. On a Saturday evening collecting trip out on the jetty, we were able to net the following:

1 PIPEFISH :shock:
4 Seargent Major Damsels (three VERY Small...one nearly 3 inches).
4 Blennies of some sort (still need to I.D. these guys...one is about 3 inches).
1 purple sea whip, gorgeous
1 yellow sea whip, equally so.
1 red mushroom leather (full of hairy polyps).
1 peppermint shrimp
4 small, darkly colored (with vertical stripes) fish, resembling some sort of angel fish, but we're just not sure.
2 good sized chunks of barnicle colony, good color, very much alive.

We chose not to keep any of the snails or crabs collected, as we we've heard that the crabs especially might not be good tankmates.

The sea whips are already completely full of small white polyps, and all the fish are doing well. We'd sure like to I.D. some of the fish, and we will need to make homes for a couple of them, ESPECIALLY the Pipefish. We don't think our tank set-ups make for very good homes for that type of critter. Anyone who's got seahorses, or a tank setup that might be good for pipefish (about 5 inches long from tip to tail) is welcome to respond. We'll need to find some homes for the Seargent Majors as well....so write back if you have any interest. I've read they're aggressive, especially when they get bigger, so bear that in mind.

Finally, it seems to US, that it's a big shame the trip to Corpus and Port A. was cancelled for the weekend. If we did as well as we did, without knowing what the heck we were doing, I would think the seasoned vets would have had a GREAT trip.

[Charley]

If you can't find any home for the pipefish please let me know. I have a tank in the store that is for corals, that I keep seahorses in.

Charley

[Jimnorris]

Ron,
Sounds like you had a wonderful time!
Jim

[adaminaustin]

Yeah as a kid I went to Port A once a year.
It always seemed like collecting was better after a storm. All one had to do was find some seaweed floating in the water and shake it to see what falls out.

I always found pipefish, crabs and whatever else this way ;)
Adam

[MikeP]

Where in Port A is good to look for stuff - I have mondays-tuesdays-wednesdays off and may take the dog down and see what I can catch.

It's about what 4 hours from Austin?

[rwilliams26]

Mike,

It's almost EXACTLY four hours from our house in Round Rock to the Island side of the ferry docks. We had the best luck on the channel side of the LONG jetty that runs from the north end of the Port Aransas city park/beach. You can walk out on the jetty for several hundred yards, but we were only out about 50 yards past the edge of the beach. The jetty is constructed of huge blocks of granite it looks like, and this makes for some great little holes/pools between the rocks. Small fish are safely sheltered in there. I'm sure you'll be as amazed as we were to discover just how MUCH you'll find in there. It really was WAY cool.

[TexasState]

That storm must've carry stuff in from far, far away.

[rwilliams26]

We finally identified the smallest fish we collected in Port A.. The little buggers are juvenile Atlantic Spadefish...which means the suckers are gonna get BIG :shock: !! I have also been impressed that every single specimen collected survived two days in a bucket and transition into our tanks and seem to be doing quite well. The Pipefish is NOT eating, however, and I'll be taking it in to Austin Aquariums as a donation if no one in the Austin area wants him for their home tank. As I mentioned yesterday....we really don't have the set up for a Pipefish. Also, if ANYONE might be interested in any of the Seargent Majors or Spadefish, let me know.

[Tim Marvin]

Ron, I'll give the pipe a home.