BALANCING ACT

“What’s the biggest redfish you ever get?”

I carefully unclamp one hand from the rod grip and point a crooked finger at the sharply arced tip. “That would be the one at the end of my line right now,” I say to guide Todd Seither.

Everyone laughs, but the joke will be on me if I can’t keep this bull red from spitting the hook, here in Breton Sound about 70 miles south of New Orleans.

The laughter will come as often as the speckled trout and redfish on this August trip to the marshes and islands of the Mississippi River Delta, though the Cajuns and other Louisianans who live and work here have plenty of reason to weep. Hurricane Katrina passed through here 14 years ago as it roared up the Gulf of Mexico on its catastrophic way to The Big Easy. The Deepwater Horizon drilling rig exploded and gushed more than 4 million barrels of oil into these fish-rich waters in 2010, just 60 miles from this spot. And there’s something else that threatens their way of life. But right now, only my reel is wailing because the big red I’m trying to bring in has seen the boat and is