Tremendous hauls of speckled trout during a bout of bitter cold last January focused the spotlight of fishing action on the mainland shores of Coastal Bend bays. As freezing temperatures drove trout into the sheltered waters of harbors, boat basins and subdivisions, bank fishermen lined up on the shores of Aransas Bay to fill their stringers from Fulton Beach to Rockport and on south to Aransas Pass.

It was a happening about as rare as extended periods of freezing temperatures in South Texas.

But what was serendipity up north was old hat down south on the Corpus Christi bayfront-the traditional winter haven for trout and trout anglers. The mainland shoreline of Corpus Christi Bay did experience its own freeze-related event when cold-soaked specks stacked up near the aircraft carrier Lexington, where bank fishermen caught them by the bunches.

It seems a deep hole had to be dredged to get the Lexington in place as a floating museum. Between deep water around the carrier and the heat radiated from the steel hull, the trout had found a haven from fish-killing cold. More common, however, is the modest but steady action found winter after winter by anglers who have grown up and grown old fishing the bayfront from the breakwaters of the harbor to the fences of the Naval Air Station at Oso Bay.

The reasons are simple: The shoreline borders the deep waters of Corpus Christi Bay, where trout can bide the winter in comfort.

Comprising the deepest waters of the Coastal Bend, Corpus Christi Bay, in fact, pulls wintering trout from the shallows of Redfish Bay to the north and the flats of the Laguna Madre to the south. The shoreline itself offers rocks and shallow sand bars that warm quickly after fronts to pull hungry trout toward the shore. At the same time, winds from either the north or south push bait on the shore to feed the specks as they show up.

There are also holes and guts that can hold trout close to shore in all but the coldest weather. Thus, as long as it's winter, the fishing can be good whether the weather's nasty or nice.

So Paul Houston was crazy like a fox when he fished Cole Park in the city's downtown area during the worst of last January's cold spell. Braving wind, sleet and freezing temperatures, Houston was a shadowy and lonely figure as he sat in his Hobie Float Cat about 50 yards offshore from the park's bulkheads.

But he wasn't hoping to take advantage of semi-stunned specks. Instead, he was looking for business as usual-enticing strikes on MirrOlures from a hole where winter trout have gathered for years.

And, business was good.

Houston already had seven nice specks on his stringer when I waved him into photography range, and he would take three more in the next hour to finish up his limit. It was probably the best string of trout caught that day in the entire Coastal Bend.

Although Houston was a seasoned and savvy saltwater angler when he arrived in Corpus Christi in 1983, his success along the bayfront owed a lot to lessons learned from two old timers-Jay White and J.D. Dorsey. The veteran anglers, who remain bayfront regulars to this day, taught Houston the winter secrets of the 6-mile stretch of shoreline from the breakwaters of the downtown harbor to the fences of the Naval Air Station.