The week began with Jim Olson and his good friend Gary, of Superior, Wisconsin. We had managed to continue a warming trend through the weekend, and the morning dawned calm and beautiful. The water temperature was finally breaking the 70 degree barrier. It was time to look for bait, and time to fish for snook with it.
I was to pick Jim and Gary up at the Waterfront Restaurant in St. James City, and would try to find some bait before making the run there. I was to call them when I was done, and ready to head to them. I worked the A span of the causeway in the dark without pulling up a living thing. From there I went to the B span flat where there were a couple of other boats already working on bait, but wasn't able to pull in anything but pinfish. I moved on to Picnic Island flats where the water was alive with action. There were manatees and porpoise rolling everywhere, glass minnows spraying, and trout busting in the minnows all around. But, there were no shiners to be had. I tossed a jig and caught a couple of trout, just to see what size fish we had schooled there. They weren't what I was looking for. I called Jim, and told him that it made no sense to waste any more of a good tide looking for bait.
From the Waterfront we headed to a beautiful spot in Ding Darling that I typically fish only in the spring when it really heats up. It's in a manatee zone, of course, which I try to avoid. But, in the spring it's usually worth it. And, it was worth it on this day. The hole was full of big trout every one of which ran from 3 to 5 pounds. Jim and Gary caught a bunch of them. The snook didn't eat, though, and once the bite slowed we moved on.
It was more of the same at the next stop. Lots of snook there, but it was the big trout that were eating. We caught most on Exude RT slugs in Baby Bass, and a few on pinfish suspended under a popping cork. I usually keep written records of what we catch, but I forgot to record exactly what all we caught. I don't think the boys caught any snook at that second spot. I could be wrong about that, though.
From there we decided to chase redfish, and hit two great areas that gave us no reds. At the last stop we found redfish that would eat, and caught five nice redfish on spoons. By then, our tide was out of gas, and it was time to head in. It had been a great day all round, with some great guys and some beautiful fish. Back at the Waterfront we had lunch, and then offloaded two limits of big trout and redfish into plastic bags, since there is no provision for cleaning fish there.
After a day off the water for some boat tinkering, I was back out on Wednesday with old friends Charlie Cooper and Jack Mackenzie, of East Falmouth, Mass. We've been fishing together for some five years now, and always have fun and catch fish. We were launching early, and I was determined to find bait.
We headed out to Tarpon Bay as dawn was just beginning to break. I couldn't get over how still it was. We don't see a lot of that in March, front or no front! I positioned the Talon in about 3 ft. of water and mixed up a bucket of chum, and went to work. The Talon immediately swung around on the pretty good current, and we had to place the chum at about amid-ships.
The bait came pretty quickly, and it was good to see it. Beautiful shiners from 3 inches to 7 inches. Something for everyone out there. There were also ballyhoo around, but they stayed just out of the range of my net bomb. They'd spook every time I threw it though, letting me know they were there.
It didn't take too long to load the Talon's well. I allot one hour. If it takes longer than that, something is not right. We were right on schedule, and the Talon had a full tummy. Time to fish.
We headed to one of my favorite springtime snook haunts with our well of shiners, fully expecting to encounter a good bite. I saw plenty of snook there, but we couldn't get them to eat. We did catch some nice big big fat trout there, though.
We moved on, and at our next stop we boated half dozen snook, but nothing in the slot. Another boat had come into the area, foiling my plans for fishing it. We moved on to our third spot, where we caught a few more snook, including a 30" fish that Charley brought to boat-side. Once that slowed, we were again on the move further north.
We settled on another beautiful spot that I love to fish during the spring. It gets great flow with a good tide, and holds both snook and reds, but rarely any trout. Charlie and Jack caught another half dozen snook, with another 30 inch fish landed by Charlie. We put her back to fight another day.
Finally, we were nearing the end of the tide and the water was right for chasing redfish. We headed to what would be our last stop of the day and started our hunt with spoons that were already tied on some of the rods. Charlie and Jack boated 9 nice redfish, mostly on spoons. I did pitch a few shiners out there under popping corks, and caught one that way.
It was the perfect end to a perfect day with two of my favorite guys. They'd both gotten multiple Slams. We capped it off with a stop at the Waterfront for lunch. What a great place!
Thursday was reserved for another couple of old friends, Bruce Boardman, of St. Clair Shores, Michigan, and Bill Holland, of Elk Rapids, Michigan. The weather had been perfect all week. Actually, unusually nice for March, which is most always very windy. I fully expected another great day of fishing as we left the dock.
We went straight to Tarpon Bay, where bait was again very easy to get. It was beautiful bait with a good range of size. The only thing that makes bait a pain in the butt this time of year is that the bottom is covered with this green "snot-grass" that plugs up your net and makes it very heavy, and plugs up your baitwell drain. We were loaded up and ready to fish in an hour.
We soon found out as we fished our first two spots, that was where the "easy" stopped. I don't know what had happened, but the bite was tough all day long. Those first two spots gave us some nice trout, a big flounder, and a ladyfish, but nothing like the previous days. Our next stop gave the boys a couple of snook, and then at another spot farther to the north Bruce and Bill caught a few more snook. Oh, we had lots of bait scaled and left for dead by those snook. We were on snook, but they just weren't in much of an eating mood.
Finally, we turned our attention to redfish, hoping we could pull out a good redfish bite to end the day. But, the reds wouldn't bite at all. It was a lockjaw situation. Frustrating, to say the least. Bruce and Bill were patient and took it in stride, and are great to fish with. We ended our day once again at the Waterfront Restaurant.
I finished the week Friday with Gary Owens, of Lexington, Ohio. This would be the first of three scheduled trips. I was not feeling very confident about delivering Gary a real productive trip in terms of fish caught, after the bite being so tough the day before.
Bait had been good at Tarpon Bay all week though, so that's where we began our day. And, except for all the slop in the water, bait was again pretty easy. I'd loaded the boat with more bait than I could possibly use every day this week.
We headed up to McIntyre Creek to begin our day. I wanted to start Gary off with some trout fishing, and put some meat into the boat. There were plenty of trout there, and they bit well for some time. But, no bite lasts forever!
Next we moved on up to another spot in Ding Darling. Man, it was on fire with out-sized trout and snook. Gary caught trout after trout that ran 4 and 5 pounds. The largest was 5.5 pounds. He also got a few snook, and we lost a huge mama after it jumped completely out of the water twice like a tarpon. What a fish. It was already out away from the mangrove roots, but apparently found something suspended off the bottom to cut the leader on. It was a clean cut. But, at least we got two good looks at her.
We spent most of our day at that first spot catching fish. We had two-thirds of a Slam, and I wanted to try to put Gary on a redfish real quickly. We took a short ride, and stopped at a great snook/redfish spot. Gary caught a few more snook before hooking into his redfish, but he did get a nice 28 inch fish to end the day. And, a good day it had been with a very nice guy, and skilled angler.
We are already moving into a week of long, slow tides that are very hard to fish. It's hard to say what next week will bring, but I suspect the bite will be off in spite of the warm weather.