David Sikes
David Sikes is a product of a Catholic and Cajun upbringing. He grew up fishing, hunting and camping in the Bayou Teche area of South Louisiana. He is an Eagle Scout with a journalism degree from the University of Houston.
After working as a news reporter for several small Texas newspapers, David joined the Corpus Christi Caller-Times staff in 1997, covering Port Aransas, Rockport, Aransas Pass, as well as coastal issues. In 1998, David became the paper’s Outdoors columnist. He retired in 2019, after 23 years with the Caller-Times.
Conservation issues he has embraced include the promotion of freshwater inflows into Texas estuaries, boating courtesy on shallow bays, youth recruitment into the outdoors, red snapper management, seagrass protection, reopening of Cedar Bayou, and Texas Parks & Wildlife Coastal Fisheries management strategies.
For two years, he continued to promote coastal and conservation issues, while writing about fishing, hunting, camping, nature photography, state and federal wildlife and fisheries regulations and legislative issues involving the same as an editor/columnist for Saltwater Angler Magazine, and writer/photographer for other Texas publications. Beyond Texas, David has written stories and photographed for magazines and newspapers about fishing and/or hunting in Alaska, Colorado, South Dakota, Montana, New Mexico, Louisiana, Florida, Alabama, Tennessee, Arkansas, Idaho, Mexico, Costa Rica, Canada, the Bahamas, and Nicaragua.
David was awarded the Ducks Unlimited Wetland Conservation Achievement Award for 2012 in the communications category, and the Harvey Weil Foundation named him its Professional Conservationist of the year for 2012. The Texas Wildlife Association honored David that same year with its Charly McTee Outdoor Media Award. In 2006, the Coastal Bend Bays Foundation honored him with a Conservation & Environmental Stewardship Award for promoting public awareness of conservation issues, and later he received the organization’s President’s Award for his conservation work.
David is a past president, chairman, and board member for the Texas Outdoor Writers Association, and was a member of the Outdoor Writers Association of America, earning numerous awards from both professional organizations for his writing and photography. In 2016, TOWA bestowed its highest honor on David, the L.A. Wilke Award for meritorious service to his profession.
He currently holds the position of board secretary for the Wildlife in Focus conservation/education nonprofit, and is editor of the Wildlife in Focus book series. David is a founding and life member of FlatsWorthy, a nonprofit of diverse anglers with mutual respect, who promote boating courtesy, while denouncing behavior that destroys or degrades our shallow-water coastal fisheries. He lives on north Padre Island with his miniature dachshund Pepper.
His photography is displayed, and occasionally sells, at the Padre Island Art Gallery and the Port Aransas Center for the Arts.