FLORIDA FISHING REPORT FOR THE WEEK ENDING 12/15/07
by
Capt. Butch Rickey
Southwest Florida fishing report: Flats and backcountry are Good!
I managed to run two out of three scheduled trips this week. Bait is getting tough, the fishing was good, and the weather still unseasonably warm.
The first trip was on Wednesday with Billy Herrington, whom I first fished with back in December of 2005. The day we fished was a cold, blowing, and miserable one. It was tough fishing. Fortunately, Billy was willing to give me and the weather another chance, and he drew a beautiful weather day.
We began our adventure at 0630 hrs. I was standing at the foot of the dock talking to Capt. Steve Waugh in the dark. There was some activity, so I didn't think much about it when a man walked past us like he knew exactly where he was going, and bid us good morning. About ten minutes later I happened to look out over the ramps and realized there was someone standing on the dock by my Talon. I shuffled on down to see who it was, and it was Billy. It was he who had walked past us in the dark, and neither of us could see well enough to recognize the other. After a good laugh, we were ready to go try to catch bait.
Since it was still unseasonably warm, I decided to see if I could still get bait on the B Span flats. Well, there were plenty of pinfish, but we never saw the first shiner or theadfin. I had anticipated the possibility of that happening, so I'd brought along my heavy bridge net. I sure didn't want to have to thrown it, though, as the net that Daddy Pat Burns custom sewed for me has spoiled me, and is very kind to my back.
We headed back to the A Span, where I turned the helm over to Billy, along with my life! He did a great job of maneuvering the boat into position for me to throw on the large bulkheads that are the foundation for the new causeway. We struck out for the first few minutes, but finally found tons of very small bait out around the center of the span where the water was really ripping. It appeared we'd have to make do with 2 to 3 inch baits.
The water would be quickly falling off the flats until around 11 AM. We had tiny bait that would be hard to cast. I chose my first spot on those criterion. We had immediate action! Billy missed the first several snook that bit. He had to get past striking when he felt the bite. But, after that he still caught several snook, several mangrove snapper, a ladyfish, jacks, a big gafftop sailcat, and I think also a grouper. At another spot nearby, Billy tangled with a couple of big fish, but they quickly had him tangled in the submerged cover, and cut him off.
WINTER FISHING IS HERE!
WINTER FISHING IS HERE!
WINTER FISHING IS HERE!
As the tide was nearing full low we headed to another spot. Its always full of snook, as well as trout, snapper, grouper, and sometimes redfish. But, the water was so clear as well as shallow, I finally decided that we'd probably not see any action even when the tide did move. We got one jewfish and a few small snapper, and moved on.
We headed to one of my favorite winter trout spots to see if the fish were staged there, yet. They were. We caught then every way you could catch them. We started off with Bass Assassin and Exude jigs worked very slowly on the bottom. The trout ate them up. But, as I reeled one in quickly a nice trout literally chased it down and ate it, breaking all the rules. So, we did that presentation on purpose, and caught more. We also tail-hooked the small shiners to keep them on top, and pinned the shiners on the bottom with a jig head. They ate those, too.
As we were loading up on nice trout, I realized
we had bait all around us in this spot we were fishing. I couldn't believe my eyes, and wondered why there would be bait here, and not where I had begun that morning near deep water. At first I figured it was just threadfins, and opted not to dirty the boat up again throwing the net. But, the bait just kept parading by; thousands of them. I got down on my knees for a closer look and realized they were too thick across the shoulders to be threadfins. They had to be shiners. I quickly got out my flats net and gave it a throw. I emptied the contents right into the well to keep down the mess, and we must have had 500 beautiful shiners. That changed my plans somewhat.
I suggested to Billy that we used the dead water time to get lunch, and then go back out with our big baits and see if we could get on a snook bite somewhere. We headed to the Waterfront, which Billy hadn't forgotten since last time.
Our waitress asked if we'd ever had blackened scallops. Neither of us had, and she made them sound wonderful. We went for it. Well, wonderful is a gross abuse of the English language, and a very weak adjective to describe how good those blackened scallops were. woderful would be a better word! I've never had anything quite like it.
Once we were done basking in the glory of those scallops, we were ready to head back out. We headed into Matlacha Pass where we found immediate action. I anchored and began chumming with our beautiful bait, letting them glide off on the strong current. Snook began blowing them out of the water. I tail-hooked a large bait and pitched it to right where a snook had blasted a bait in the shallows. She crushed the bait, then nothing. Then all hell broke loose, and Billy knew he was in a fish fight. A few minutes and some anxious moments later, he had the 28" snook at the boat.
WINTER FISHING IS HERE!
We continued fishing that area, chumming as we went. It was the only way we could get the fish to eat. Without the chumming all was quiet. Each round of chum would net us a fish or two. Hey. Sometimes that's the way snook act, and it's just one more reason we catch so much bait. When you have to chum them to get them to eat, you can chum yourself right out of business pretty quickly if you don't have tons of bait. Finally, the snook stopped and we were only catching snapper. We called it a day, as it was around 4 PM.
It had been a great day, and I thoroughly enjoyed Billy. I certainly liked him from the first trip, but you don't get that much time to get to know someone in one trip. On this second trip we had more time to chat and joke around, and get to know each other. Can't wait 'till next time.
I was more than ready for Friday's trip with my long-time fishing buddy, Dr. Ron Kolata. You regular readers probably recognize the name and know how much I love fishing with Ron. We always have a blast. Unfortunately, for the past year Ron has been knee deep in career changes and moving, and hasn't been able to wet a line. So, he was more than ready to get on the water. I figured the best thing I could do would be to try to keep Ron on a bite for as long as possible, and not worry about being a species snob, as Billy had so aptly put it the day before.
Ron flew in Thursday evening and wasn't in a hurry to get up with the chickens, so we set our date at eight. I was up and on the water at my usual time hoping to find bigger bait on the A Span. I wore myself out throwing the net, and had a few above the average baits, but most were small. I was hoping that I'd again be able to find those big shiners right where I'd left them in the Sound, but knew that I couldn't absolutely count on it. Anyway, Ron was walking down the dock as I pulled in, and we were quickly off and running.
I decided to begin right where I had the day before, since we had a good bite, and I knew the fish were there. They were there, but weren't biting well without plenty of chum. Of course, everyone has to reprogram themselves not to strike until completely tight to the fish, and Ron was no exception. He missed a few snook bites, but did catch a few snook and snapper before we moved on.
Ron loves steady action, and he's not particular about what it is. It was time to go trout fishing. Boy, were the trout on. The hole was full of nice trout, including plenty of nice slot fish, and they didn't much care what we threw at them, what color it was, or how we presented the bait. They ate everything, live and plastic. At one point Ron asked, "How many hundred trout have we caught so far?" I asked him if he wanted to move on and do something different. His reply was, "Hell no! We're catching fish!"
So, after tons of trout and realizing that big bait was AWOL and not going to show up, I took Ron to a great big trout spot to see if we could get into the big winter trout we typically have if they haven't been wiped out by red tide. The trout were there, and bit well until the tide came to a halt. Ron caught some beautiful fish there.
WINTER FISHING IS HERE!
With the water dead, it was time for lunch. We went straight to the Waterfront Restaurant and ordered those blackened scallops. They were fabulous. Ron observed that my plate was much fuller than his. I reminded him that the folks there know me pretty well!
From there we went to the seafood plant to pick up stone crabs for Ron's wife, Pat. We all love those stonies. While carrying a large shovel of ice back to the cooler, I smacked the wing on the rod locker latch and split my pinkie toe wide open. Oh! I hate when that happens. Talk about bloody Reefs!
Once the crabs were loaded and iced, we headed off in search of snook. I didn't know if we could get them to eat our small baits or not, because I think they're already in the mode of measuring every potential meal against how much energy will be expended to run it down in the cold water.
Shortly after throwing the first bat of chum, I saw a school of jack crevalle rise. They are so much fun to catch, and there's nothing in the shallows that pulls harder for it size than a jack. It's the only fish in the shallows that can single handedly surround the boat! They'll run around and around the boat, circling you like a band of Indians, and you'd better keep up. Well, Ron dropped a shiner right on them and got crashed immediately. But, the old strike monster got him, and he missed the fish. In typical jack fashion, the schoolers disappeared in spite of my chumming efforts to keep them there.
Ron did catch a few snook, along with some more snapper. But, we didn't get the bigger fish to eat those small baits. Perhaps if we'd had those big shiners they would have eaten. Who knows? It didn't matter. Ron and I had as usual, had a blast, and stayed on action the whole day. But, now the weather that had threatened all day was becoming active. We heard the first roll of thunder, and realized we had a large area of rain coming. We decided it was time to head in. We got wet, but were able to skirt the worst of it. But, before I was done cleaning the boat, the weather really came in, and we got a good, much needed rain and thunderstorm. I was glad we'd come home when we did.
It was a hard day on my left foot, though. As I was tying up at the dock, the anchor rope caught on the anchor locker lid hatch and dropped it squarely on the big toe of my already damaged foot. Oh, man! Well, if it hadn't hit across the nail it would have been a lot worse. As it is, it's just blue.
It's Saturday as I pen this, and my wind chimes are playing hard rock outside. We've got a south wind gusting to near 25! The rain has stayed just offshore and to our south, but will move in before it's over. Perhaps we could have gotten a trip in today, but I was never able to connect with my customer. I left a couple of messages on his cell, but if his doesn't work any better than mine, he may have never gotten them.
Until next week, tight lines!
Be sure to check out www.BestFishingBooks.com, Books and gifts for fishermen from my friend Jim Dicken!