This week has been some what of a roller coaster, on fire one day and the fishing tough the next.
Monday's trip was to the southern end of Mosquito Lagoon in search of the big reds. And boy did we find them! With a dozen hand picked shrimp along with some pigfish in the livewell pulled us in 8 redfish over 11 pounds with the largest going 17. A few slot size in the mix along with several ladyfish and trout kept us busy all morning.
Wednsday looked like a duplicate of monday, no wind and baitfish so thick you could nearly walk on them. Going all artificial was the plan - and it worked. Throwing a High Roller Rip Roller on the edges of bars worked well getting us 8 or 9 keeper size trout with a few smaller one's. The biggest was 28 inches, just over 6 pounds. Looking way on the other side of the flat I spotted a disturbance on the water making me head straight to the poling platform. As we got closer sure enough, it was a school of between 75 - 100 redfish and they were hungry. Not all that big, but Rip Tide jerkbaits in the electric chicken color got us 18 fish up to 24 inches.
Thursday looked like another repeat - wrong! We had plenty of pigs on board so trout fishing it was with hopefully a red or 2 mixed in. Making my way down to the same area that's been hot for weeks now seemed ice cold on this day. The highlight of the day was working an area with rolling tarpon and jumping one well over 100 pounds on 10 pound braided line. On the last tailwalk he spit the hook as I was chasing him with the boat. But for the time he was on, quite a show it was with a jump literaly less than 10 feet from the boat. We ended up with 3 redfish and a few undersize trout with one 5 pounder and a couple jacks.
Fishing will only get better with the mullet invasion, so put the theme parks on hold for a day and check out some space coast flats fishing!
Capt. Jeff