Venturing down to an area that has been holding reds for months now still proves to be good.
Thursday's trip was all by myself (for a change) in search of redfish for friday's charter. After cast netting around 2 dozen mullet, off I was around a half hour after daylight to an area with sandholes up against a shoreline with mullet being busted on everywhere you looked. Off with the mullet heads was up first (mullet heads are one of the best cut baits to use) tossing my bait right up against the bank where it drops off quickly to 3 feet of water.
Within 5 minutes, fish on!! This was not a very big one but told me, here they are. After gently returning the red to his home to fight another day, there goes my other rod bending and hooked up. This fish was bigger and once I got him to the boat for a quick measurment of 32 inches, off he swam. I ended the day with 8 reds up to 9 pounds with most going 23-25 inches, good slot size fish. Not too bad of a day.
Friday's charter was with an excellent fly fisherman, Dave Cook. He wanted to at least get a few reds on spinning gear so down I went to the same spot as yesterday. Once again with cut bait his mullet head was picked after putting down the Power Pole by a decent red going 22 inches. We stayed here for 3 hours and boated 11 reds up to 26 inches. Also he landed 2 trout, one 27 inches and the other "gator" went just under 30 inches. Time for the fly!! Getting out of the wind I silently moved through the shallow grass infested waters of Mosquito Lagoon's western shoreline. Singled up reds gave Dave several shots and with a drop of a fly right on the nose of a tailing redfish, he turned and inhaled the Keys bonefish fly that Dave tied up. 27 inch 7 pound fish. Nice job!
Rip Tide flats chubs rigged Texas style have also produced good catches of reds and trout in 1-2 feet of water mostly in grassy areas. The topwater bite is still good, but has been shutting down within an hour. Go with a High Roller Rip Roller.
Great fishing all this month, book now to get up close and personal with our famous Mosquito Lagoon redfish!
- Capt. Jeff