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After having everything canceled this week because of Wilma, I did manage to get in one spur of the moment trip, to my surprise. Although I have already sent out a Hurricane Report, it's only fair that I publish a report on this one trip. Although it was a very hard day, it was a fun day with some great guys.
My customers were Duncan McBride, who is a ten year resident, and his good friends Richard and Rick. Rich and Rick were in town for Duncan's wedding on Captiva on Saturday. Duncan wanted to get them out for a day of fishing before the wedding.
I explained to Duncan that conditions were tough, and that fishing would likely be tough. He understood, but wanted to get his buds out on the water for a day while they were here.
It was a cool, but beautiful morning. I ran into a guide-friend of mine at the ramp who had fished the day before, and he reported no bait and only three fish caught. The other few that were working gave similar reports. Not what I wanted to hear. I did hear reports of bait all the way up in the north end of the Sound around Bokeelia, but that's way too far to run from the south end, especially considering fuel costs and time spent.
I decided to hear straight to the flats at Flamingo, which is where most of the bait was coming from before all this weather mess. I knew that at least there would be tons of pinfish and perhaps some passing schools of threadfins. With Rick helping me with the chumming, we quickly had plenty of pins in the well. On about the fourth or fifth throw, I actually had a few shiners in the net. I couldn't believe it, and couldn't wait to throw again. We had them coming! But, once I got the bait sorted out and in the well, and the net folded for the next throw, I realized we had been blown off our Power Pole anchor, probably because we'd had a big weight shift in the Talon. Damn! We were starting over.
I moved back to approximately where we had been on the trolling motor, and set the anchor. We chummed and threw, and chummed and threw, to no avail. The shiners had left us. Our high tide was early, and I kept thinking about the time we were spending on bait. I decided it prudent to go with what we had in the well, not wanting to miss too much of the available moving water. And, it wasn't a strong tide to begin with. We made a quick stop at a hole where I'd been getting threadfins. It was my ace in the hole for bait, but the front had blown them out, too. Not a thread to be seen.
Given the tide and bait we had, I figured our best shot at a good day would be redfish. After all, it's October, and the flats should be lousy with reds. Well, the reds were on the flats, but THEY were lousy! They just wouldn't eat. We had several pick up our cut baits, and quickly reject them! They were mildly interested, but not willing to eat under the conditions we had. The conditions? Blue bird skies after a big front. High pressure. Big drop in water temperature. A recipe for lockjaw.
After fishing hard for reds in a very fertile redfish flat for a couple hours, I decided to take our 8 or 10 shiners and see if we could find a dumb snook that would eat. We worked hard, but did find a few snook. We caught only four, but two were keepers. Rich caught one, and Rick another. Both were right under 28 inches. Three of them were caught on........cut pinfish. That told me that the water temperature had dropped enough to really slow the snook down. We also caught one on a shiner under a float, and a big trout on a live pinfish under a float. But, that was it! Five fish.
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Although the catching was slow, the fishing was great! And, so was the company. Duncan, Rick, and Rich made the day a very enjoyable and memorable one for me. Duncan, who has been out with quite a few of our local guides, told me that he had learned much, and liked the fact that unlike others he'd been out with, I not only told him what to do to catch our fish, but explained why.
Although Wilma is long gone, many of us are without power and telephone service. Power is spotty in my area. That is making it hard to do business. We can't get gas out of the ground without electricity. It's impossible to communicate via phone or internet without power and telephone service. I'm very hopeful that power will be restored in my area before the weekend is over.
Monday and Tuesday's trips are canceled. I'm hopeful that I will be able to get in my trips Wednesday through Friday. Time will tell!
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