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Once again a hurricane claimed most of the business for this past week. Her name of course, was Jeanne. Although we didn't feel the full force or her fury, we did get steady winds here in southwest Florida to around 50 MPH, and gusts to around 60! We were on the dry side, so we didn't have much associated rain. Of course, the first half of the week was windy, and I managed to salvage one trip on Wednesday.
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I was supposed to fish with Jim Vaigl, and his brother-in-law Frank Trenton, on Tuesday. Things were still pretty breezy, so we opted to put the trip off to Wednesday. The irony was that Wednesday was as still and hot as an August afternoon. There was no air moving. Of course, the water was a mess, still brown with tannic acid, and full of turtlegrass floating in large clumps virtually everywhere! That was probably our biggest obstacle to overcome that day. We got plenty of pinfish at Picnic Island, and also chummed for bait at Tarpon Bay and at Chino Island. We never saw the first shiner. The tide was still on the last bit of outgoing, so we had a little time to kill before the incoming tide began.
It was a pretty low tide, and seemed about right for some winter-style pothole fishing. We arrived at the first pothole with the water still falling, but about done. To my surprise, the boys managed several trout, several snook, and a redfish, for a Slam in the first hole. The snook were small, but we saw some larger fish blow up bait at the edge of the hole. One of the trout was a nice keeper. Against all the rules of nature, once the tide began flowing in, things stopped. Go figure.
We headed to another deep hole where snook always lay on low tides. We fished it hard with both baits under floats, and pinfish pinned to the bottom looking for reds, but never had so much as a bite. I saw plenty of fish moving in the hole, but they weren't the least interested in what we were offering. We were on the full moon, so I'm sure that was a contributing factor. We headed to a series of potholes on the west side of the Sound hoping to find some hungry snook. The snook were there, but weren't about to eat our pinfish.
It was time to turn our attention to redfish. We could see plenty of reds pushing around on the flats, and even saw a large school approach our position. But, getting them to bite was another story. They just weren't very interested. We fished that area hard, then moved to a couple of other spots within a mile or so, but only managed a handful of redfish. Jim also got a nice snook that was just short of keeping size, and our total for the day was around 15 fish, pretty evenly divided between reds, snook, and trout. That included a large stingray that gave a terrific fight for a while. We did take a limit of redfish and one fat trout home for dinner. Frank had never had the pleasure of eating any of our local fish, but that has changed by now.
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When we were sure the bite was over for the day, we headed for the Waterfront Restaurant for a very late lunch. That was another treat for Frank. It wasn't a fast and furious day of catching, but all in all, it was a great, fun day with a couple of great guys.
There's not much happening next week. But, things kick into high gear in the second week of October, and there should be plenty of fishing to write about, then. My gut tells me the fishing on the good October tides is going to be great. Stay tuned!
If you want to be able to continue to fish Florida waters please follow this link, "Manatee Zones: How You Can Help" and please take the time to become involved, even if you don't live in Florida. Let the politicians know WHY you come to Florida on vacation!
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