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I hope all my friends and subscribers had a great Thanksgiving Day. Of course, I took the day off, and had four days booked for the week. Not surprisingly, weather got in the way of one trip.
My old friend, Mike Howard, who lives in St. James City part of the year, and in New Hampshire part of the year, was first up this week. Mike bravely faced lung cancer just a few years ago, and beat it, and is looking just great. He now actually has a little extra meat on his bones, and it's great to see!
Although it was a week of pretty good tides, they were the tides on the full moon, and inshore fishing can be tough. I hoped we could get the fish to eat, even with full tummies. After meeting Mike at the Waterfront Restaurant, we headed back to Picnic Island for bait. We got a good combination of big and small pinfish, shiners and threadfins, and were soon off to the first hole.
Since we were on the low tide, I thought pothole fishing for trout was in order. I brought a couple of my new St. Croix Legend Tournament Series rods especially for jigging the trout, and we rigged them with Bass Assassin green bodies. We had a good bite at our first stop, and caught trout after trout. We didn't keep count, but we caught a bunch! Mike also caught a flounder and a ladyfish.
From there I introduced Mike to shallow water grouper fishing. Shallow water grouper are really tough customers on light tackle. We're fishing 15 pound test Power Pro on light rods with Shimano Stella 2500 or 4000 reels, and the only way to get those grouper out of their rocky digs is to screw the drags down to where it's hard to pull line from the reel, and really kick butt once they strike. You've only got a second or two to get them stopped and turned around, or it's over. If the grouper is still able to strip line against the tight drag, which many of them are, you have to just grab the reel spool, and stop them. They WILL cut you off if you don't stop them, so the philosophy is to make them break you off. They often cut you off in the first second or two, regardless of what you do. He managed to dig 7 or 8 grouper out of the rocks, and lost at least as many. If you can bat .500 at this game, you're doing pretty darned good.
As the grouper action slowed we turned our attention to redfish. Once we were set up on or spot and chumming, we had some action, but not what I was looking for. They weren't in a real eating mood. Oh, Mike caught some nice fish, but half a dozen was all we could muster.
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We finished the day chasing snook. With the tide about done, we didn't have long to find them and get them to eat, but after the first hole didn't pan out, another spot nearby did the trick. Mike caught a dozen snook before the bite was over, and we were ready to head home. We finished a great day with a great lunch at the Waterfront Restaurant, where Mike's wife, Cindy, joined us.
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I had my first trip Tuesday with Harold Singer and his life-long friend Howard Rubin, of Chicago, Illinois. As soon as I met Harold and Howie at the ramp I was sure we were going to have a great time, regardless of how the fishing went. We had a front to our north, and the wind was around to the south at 20 plus, and I really thought the fish would eat. But, as we found after we had gathered bait at Tarpon Bay, it wasn't the case. The fish weren't very interested in eating. And, there were no shiners to be had on the south end of the Sound. We began a little later than usual, and that could have been the reason. Sometimes, if you don't get shiners just as the sun is coming up, you just don't get them.
I decided to introduce Harold and Howie to grouper fishing, since they're quite fond of pinfish, and we had plenty of those. We headed to one of my favorite grouper spots. The boys soon found that the inshore, shallow water grouper were really tough customers, especially on 15# line. They got their clocks repeatedly cleaned, but were having a blast trying to get those fish out of their rocky homes. They both got a few fish, but they lost more than they landed, by far.
As the tide continued to flood the flats things were getting right to try to put the boys on some redfish. I felt sure I could get them to eat. But, once we were set up on our flat, the action was very slow. OH, the fish were there, but they weren't interested. But, the several redfish we did catch were beauties. Howie got a beautiful 10 pound, 29+ inch fish on a cast that must have been 200 feet from the boat. By the time he got the fish to the boat, his arm was aching. Howie said that one redfish like that on light gear was quite enough. The guys also caught a large speckled trout and a limit of catfish!
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In spite of the slow catching, the fishing was a blast, and the company was great, and we had a ball. Back at the dock Harold told me that he had been fishing with hundreds of guides over some forty years, and that I was one of the very best he had ever fished with. Wow! Talk about making my day. What a wonderful thing for him to say, and for me to hear. He also intimated that he would write a testimonial for the website, so I'm interested to see what he might have to say.
After a couple of days off for Thanksgiving, I was to be back at it on Friday with John Howell, his son, and son-in-law. John lives and practices law in Orlando, and is building a home in St. James City. Our front had passed through on Wednesday, and I was really concerned about our Friday trip. I had fished with John the first time back a couple of months ago, and we had a great trip, with lots of fish caught. I knew he wanted to put the boys on a great bite, and felt certain it wasn't likely to happen what with the high pressure built in, and the full moon. I decided to wait until Friday morning to see how conditions looked. I put the Talon in the water and headed to the Waterfront Restaurant in St. James, where I was to meet John and the boys. I explained how I saw the day unfolding, and they took my recommendation to reschedule at another time, and just go out in John's boat and have some fun. We had a good time chatting over breakfast before I headed back to Punta Rassa.
It was blowing pretty hard out of the northeast Saturday morning as my old friend John Hitt and I headed out into the river toward the Sound. We knew it would be an ugly, tough day to be out, with now water in the Sound for most of the day, but John really wanted to fish, and I was with him, regardless.
We began our trek for bait at Picnic Island, moving to Tarpon Bay, moving to, moving to.... We got plenty of pinfish, but no shiners or threadfins. Finally, we headed up to the area of Demere Key to see if we could find some trout in the potholes in the area. The water was so dark, the potholes were almost impossible to find, and we only managed a handful of trout. But, we moved to a pothole in another area a few miles away, and caught plenty of trout.
We decided to use some of our pinfish to catch some of those feisty inshore grouper, but as we were about to leave Demere we saw bait flashing everywhere around us. I couldn't resist, of course, and we got out the net and made a toss. In one throw I had tons of shiners, threadfins, and pins. John wanted to make sure he still remembered how to throw the net, and made one toss to add to the bounty. We were all set. John caught some nice gag grouper, and missed a few as well. It's hard to do any better than one out of two fish to the boat.
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Once the grouper action was slowed, we headed to the flats to try for redfish. The water was just crawling, no doubt held up by the north wind, and the fish weren't in a mood to eat. But, we did manage a couple of nice reds in a fairly short time. Since we couldn't keep more than those two, we decided to move on and try for snook. But, the snook handed us the old skunk, refusing to eat.
So, we didn't get our Slam, but we'd taken a lousy looking weather day and turned it into fun. Yes! We got bounced around a bit, and wet coming and going but it was great fun, nonetheless! And, we had some nice redfish for dinner.
If you're wondering what to get your favorite angler who has everything for Christmas, here's a thought. I have decided to sell several of my retired Stella 4000 and 2500 F's. I have 3 of the 4000's and 1 of the 2500's that I'm willing to part with. I always keep one of each series of reel I use for my curio. Anyone who has fished with me once or twice knows how anal I am about my expensive gear, and how well I maintain it. Actually, these Stella F models were pretty much reserved for my regular customers who I knew I could trust not to abuse them, and weren't used on a daily basis. I did maintain them myself, as I have all the special tools required to open them up, however, they were also sent in to the Shimano Platinum Service folks for annual physicals and a D & C. The reels are perfect, with the boxes, papers, and protective pouches. The 4000's generally retailed for about $539, and the 2500's around $475. I'm asking $400 per reel, and they're worth every penny.
Well, that's it for this week. I hope all of you had a wonderful, relaxing Thanksgiving Holiday with your families and friends.
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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