It was a week of great customers, poor tides, variable weather, and variable fishing.
First up on Monday were Jeff Falk, his wife Pat, and daughter Courtney, down from Englewood, Florida. I liked them as soon as I met them and knew we were going to have a great time regardless of how the fishing went. We were laughing and cutting up before they even stepped foot on the Talon. We had a very tough 16 hour tide to fish, and I knew the bite would be tough. Having good humored, fun folks who would laugh at my silly jokes would go a long way toward making a tough day of catching a fun day of fishing!
We headed straight to the flats on the west side of B span to catch bait. I figured that was the place to start since bait had gotten a bit tough at Tarpon Bay toward the end of last week. If it wasn't there, we'd chum our way north looking for bait. But, it was there. Big time! It didn't take long at all to load the Talon with a great mix of shiners of all sizes. We were going fishing!
As I've said many times before, when the tide is barely moving I like to try to find places where the water movement is augmented by the venturi effect. That usually means cuts, passes, places where there's a sharp change in bottom contour from deep to very shallow, and so forth. All these things accelerate the water flow. That's the one thing you must have to catch snook.
We settled on such a place and went to work. To my amazement, even in this place where the water had to squeeze down as if going through a funnel, the water movement was barely perceptible. With that said, it was also to my amazement that Jeff and Courtney caught five snook. We had at least killed the skunk.
Once I was sure the bite was over we moved on, settling on a beautiful mangrove key with nice deep holes all around it. It's always full of snook this time of year! It was tough, but Jeff and Court caught four more nice snook there. Once we'd worn out our welcome, we moved on.
SPRING FISHING FUN!
At the next mangrove island we scored a goose egg. We had baits scaled by lethargic snook, but never got a real hit. That's so typical of poor tide fishing. Knowing we had a big flat spot in the already poor tide that would occur around the noon hour, I suggested we go to the Waterfront Restaurant for lunch, and thereby avoid the crowds that would surely gather at around the noon hour. We would fish some more after lunch. Everyone was in agreement, so off we went. We got there at a bit before noon, and ahead of the crowds. After a fabulous lunch, we were ready to get back out there and beat on some more snook for a while.
We took up position on another beautiful mangrove key that loads up with snook this time of year, hoping that I could work some kind of miracle. Perhaps it was a miracle that Jeff and Court caught four more snook on such a do-nothing tide. The bottom line though, was that Jeff and Courtney were happy with their 13 snook, and Pat had enjoyed a relaxing day just watching us carry on trying to catch those fish. We'd had a blast laughing and cutting up, and Jeff and Courtney had done a great job of getting dialed in to this fishing even though there weren't a lot of bites and hookups to allow them to practice and get it right.
By the time we were done there, it was time to think about heading home. I think we all did so with the satisfaction that we'd managed to squeak out some nice snook on a very tough tide day.
Tuesday was a great day, as well. It was my first trip with Bob Greiser and his ten year old son Joe, of Waterford, Michigan. Once we were loaded and had a chance to chat a bit, we headed out toward the flats at B span, again. Once there, I began the chumming routine, and then turned duties over to Joe while I threw the net. I didn't take us long to catch plenty of bait for a day of fishing.
But, getting something to eat it would prove a challenge, indeed. At the first stop the boys managed 1 trout, 1 ladyfish, and 1 snook. It was a tough bite, for sure. We were in a place that was absolutely full of fish, and they just weren't interested in our minner-dinners. We moved on.
SPRING FISHING FUN!
I decided to take Bob and Joe grouper digging. Often the grouper will play when the other fish won't. And, right from the start we had great action. Those grouper were just blasting those baits for everything they were worth. Bob did pretty well with them. He caught a few, broke off a few, and hung several in the rocks. But, using the old offshore grouper trick of taking all the tension off the line and waiting a while, twice he got fish out of the rocks with it.
Now, Joe was another story. At ten years old, and without much body mass, the grouper had their way with him. In fairness, he was the one that got all the big grouper hits. It was clear that he was getting hammered by larger grouper than his Dad, as they'd snatch his arms straight out in front of him, and nearly yank him out of the Talon when they hit. The Stella would scream for a couple of seconds and the grouper would cut him off in the rocks. At another spot nearby, Joe got his first jack crevalle, his first jewfish, and another snook.
SPRING FISHING FUN!
SPRING FISHING FUN!
We took a break at the slowest part of the tide, and went to the Waterfront for lunch. We went back out after lunch to see if we could coax a few more lazy fish into biting. At the first stop the boys managed a big, beautiful speckled trout, a good sized jack and a snook. But, we couldn't get anything else to eat, and moved on. At what would be the last stop of the day Joe scored three more snook to wrap up the day in good fashion. Although it might not have been what we'd typically see on a good tide day in April, it was pretty darned good for backcountry fishing on a sixteen hour tide, and we'd had fun.
SPRING FISHING FUN!
SPRING FISHING FUN!
My Wednesday trip was the first with Art Ruszenas and his son Rob. They showed up smiling and ready to go. My concern was that we were going to have a big southwest wind to deal with. It was the precursor to a late season cold front headed our way. I had decided that we would catch bait and fish the Sanibel side so that we could at least have a little bit of lee to fish, and make the trip home with. But, I hadn't fished that side in a long time because of the constant big east wind we'd had through nearly all of March.
We went straight to the B Span flats, where with Rob chumming we loaded the Talon with plenty of bait in short order. It was a great mix of beautiful shiners from 3 to 7 inches long. We were ready to fish. I headed into the building wind to the Sanibel shoreline, and ran along the manatee buoys to our first spot.
I wanted to fish a series of potholes that are usually full of snook this time of year. The wind was about due south when we arrived, and would make them difficult to fish. But, the fish proved to be more difficult, and though they continually scaled our baits, they wouldn't eat! Even with the howling south wind, the poor tide was taking it's time making places available to fish.
At our next stop we found snook that would eat, and we spent the rest of the morning working the area. Art and Rob caught 6 snook as I recall, including 2 keepers, along with a nice speckled trout. But, the tide died early and we spent the last part of our trip trying in vain to get fish to eat who just weren't interested. In spite of the slow catching, Art and Rob had caught some nice fish, and had kept one snook and one trout to feed the gang. We'd had a great time together. My decision to stay on the Sanibel side was a good one, as the ride home wasn't bad at all. It would have been a wild ride if we'd stayed east and had to cross in front of St. James City.
SPRING FISHING FUN!
SPRING FISHING FUN!
As always, I was up very early Thursday morning. I'd been listening to my wind chimes play rock and roll tunes all night long in the howling wind. But, the forecast was for mid-80's and the wind to lay down. No mention of rain in that forecast when I last looked Thursday night at ten o'clock.
I headed down to the boat yard to get hooked up and as I bent over I thought I saw a subtle flash of light in the distance. I remember thinking that a transformer must have blown up somewhere off in the distance. That's a pretty common occurrence around here when the wind is howling.
But, then as I pulled into the Circle K for gas and supplies I saw it again, but this time it lit the whole distant sky. It was lightning. Oh well, I thought. Probably just some little cell offshore. After all, there's no rain in the forecast.
But, I kept seeing it as I readied the boat for fishing. I saw it north, west, and south! How could this be? When I got to the ramp and got the boat in the water I learned from Rob Modys, who has radar on his cellphone, that the gulf was one big red mass of storms! Damn! How could this be? And, worse. My customer Frank Argus, of Long Beach, California, whom I hadn't seen in some eight years, was on his way down from Longboat Key. I had no way to reach him, but figured that if he was driving down I-75 in storms, or could see all the lightning at least, he might not even show up.
But, to his credit he did. The storms moved in around 6 AM, and we all fled to our respective vehicles for safety. I didn't realize that Frank had arrived and parked just across the way from me. I guess it rained for the better part of two hours, and once it let up it didn't take long for Frank and I to find each other. It was cool seeing Frank after so long. He said it had been one constant lightning show all the way down, and he too wondered what was going on. It appeared to be clearing to the west, but the word was that there was more on the way, and a chance for more storms in the afternoon. After laying out the possible scenarios, Frank said, "I'm here. Let's fish!"
It was a late start, and my chief concern was catching bait. It has a way of getting scarce once the sun is up. And, it proved to be tough at the B Span. We worked hard for about 60 baits, and at that point it made no sense to waste any more of the early tide we had. Why catch tons of bait only to have no tide left or fish willing to eat it? We took off filled with optimism.
At our first stop Frank caught several snook and a gorgeous 5 pound speckled trout. It was a beautiful fish. But, we'd gotten there late, and the bite didn't last long. We moved on to our next spot where Frank caught several more snook and a couple of gag grouper. But, as we fished the weather appeared to be turning on us, and given the forecast we decided not to be heroes, and headed to the Waterfront to sit it out. Once there, J.D. cued up the weather channel so that we could see what was going on. The weather was south of us except for one red cell which wound up drenching Ft. Myers Beach. Once we were sure it was safe we headed back out.
In the interest of preserving what time and tide we had left, I decided on fishing in that area. At the first stop we mustered one snook and one jack crevalle. I decided to explore the shoreline to see what we could turn up. We soon realized the shoreline was full of big snook. We sight-fished pod after pod of big, dark green females. But, even when Frank made perfect casts the fish would just swim right by his bait, as well as mine. It was cool, though. Frank seemed to be enjoying this combination of hunting and fishing.
Once we got to a break in the shoreline we decided to go wrap up the day with a bit more conventional fishing. Frank ended the day with one more snook and one more jack crevalle. To be honest it was more than I expected fishing right on the back side of a passing front.
It had been great to spend a day with Frank again after so many years, and he said he was glad we had gone fishing instead of canceling. I was, as well.
I'd been looking forward to Friday for months. It was a trip with my old friends Dr. Alan Kingston, his brother Jack, and long-time friend John Bond. Fishing with these guys is about as much fun as you can have in public with your clothes on! We generally laugh, cut up, tease, and carry on all day long. They generally come for a week and bring their Action Craft, and fish with me one day and on their own the rest of the time.
Little did I know that the front that brought all the early morning storms on Thursday, would blow the bait out. Or, so it seemed. After all. It was a big late season cold front. After we got all the gear stowed, we were off to the B Span flats, where there were quite a few boat anchored up and chumming for bait. We joined them and went to work. But, after considerable chumming an several throws of the net, we hadn't seen more than a couple of pinfish. "Oh, no!" I thought. More of what we'd seen Thursday morning.
Knowing we had another very early tide, I didn't want to waste half the morning trying to get a few dozen baits, again. I quickly decided to head north in search for bait. But, the bait had other ideas. We ran into my friend Capt. Pat Burns coming back from his hot spot, and he said he'd not seen a shiner. We pressed on, throwing first on some of the power poles taking electricity to Sanibel, and then on to Chino Island, where we tried several spots. Nothing!
I headed further north to the Marker 32 bar thinking surely there'd be bait there. Nothing. We were now burning precious minutes of our tide, and not a shiner in the boat. I decided to head to an area where we used to catch bait every spring back until a few years ago. For some reason it fell from favor, or something. I hadn't been there in a long time. We pulled into the flat noting super-clean water and beautiful turtle grass. With the water this clear, bait would be tough if it was there.
With John chumming, we set about to do or die. John was tossing the chum a good 40 feet in front of the boat, trying to get it at a distance where the bait wouldn't be boat-shy. After giving them plenty of time to gather on the chum, I launched my castnet to the end of its rope. When I pursed the net, it began to twinkle. Finally! We'd found bait. With two more throws we had the well so full I could barely see the bottom. That means at least 500 baits. We quickly cleaned up, and headed off to our first stop of the day.
With the wind from the northeast, I made my approach from that direction, and didn't realize there was another boat in the area until we'd settled on the hole. It was my friend Capt. Kelly Kaminski, who had a party of three, including a fly angler. I shouted over an apology for not realizing he was there until I was already settled in, and he assured me it was OK. We were a good distance away, but could see they were having a good time catching trout. Apparently Kelly had figured out what fly the trout would eat, as his angler seemed to be catching more trout on fly than his other anglers were catching on bait. I didn't see them catch any outsized trout, but he had a good bite going.
We were quickly on fish, as well. The boys put several beautiful trout into the well, and caught several snook and a big ladyfish, too. Of course, there were the customary number of swings and misses! By the time the bite slowed we had a good portion of the dinner order filled, but didn't have a 27 inch keeper snook.
We headed farther north into the Sound in pursuit of a keeper snook. We settled on a mangrove key still showing the wrath of hurricane Charlie. and went to work. I did a lot of chumming, and had a lot of bait getting busted, but we could only get two snook to eat a bait with a hook in it.
We headed on farther north, again. This time we settled on a deep pothole that is full of snook every time I go there, and gets great current flow when there is any tide at all. Again, I set about chumming the hole, and we had some blasts on the chum, and had many of our baits scaled by snook lipping and crippling it. But, you just can't feel it happen, because they don't move the bait at all. We couldn't get a snook to actually eat a bait, so before leaving, I had the buys get right up on the nose of the Talon with me and drove into the hole with the MinnKota. There were big snook all over the place, and plenty of smaller ones, too. They were lockjawed, though.
We decided to do a little light tackle grouper digging, since the boys had never done that. Over the next hour the guys tangled with a number of grouper, but only managed to get a few out of the rocks. Jack hooked one that immediately put him in the rocks, and he wasn't even sure if he'd had a bite. I took his rod, opened the bail to take all the pressure off the fish, and waited a minute, explaining to him that about half the time the fish will relax allowing you to sneak up on him with a hard and fast reel and a big pull to get him free before he can realize what's going on. After about a minute, I reeled as fast as I could and pulled as hard as I could, and out came the grouper. Jack couldn't believe it. He didn't believe he had a fish on! After a few grouper and two more snook we moved on.
We were at what would probably be our last spot of the day. We were still looking for that elusive keeper snook. The big wind out of the east was holding the tide back, and I wasn't even sure we had enough water to have the fish there, but it turned out they were. The trio of Alan, John, and Jack caught several more nice snook, and I believe it was John who boated one that was 26 7/8 inches. 1/8 of an inch too short on my new measuring tool.
The early tide meant an early end to the bite; around noon. Once we were sure it was over, we did something else I and the boys had never done together in all the times we've fished; a trip to the Waterfront Restaurant. We had a great lunch, some good laughs, and had to submit to a check for hooked noses from some of the girls! Back at the dock we cleaned several big trout which gave the boys plenty of fillets.
With the bait situation it hadn't been an easy day. But, we'd made it work and had lots of fun. In all the years we've been fishing together, now, I don't recall ever not having a great time with Alan, John, and Jack. Oh, they tease me about being a Fish Nazi, but at the end of the day they always tell me they've had a blast and learned a lot, and for me that's a great reward. When my anglers are learning and honing their angling skills from catching bait to handling tackle, from casting to beating big fish, I'm feeling good.
Saturday morning brought forth my first trip with Tom Jordan, his son Tom, and grandson, Alex, of Jackson, Wyoming. I could tell talking to Tom on the phone and via email he was a very likable guy, and knew we'd have fun. The one hitch in his giddy-up, was he would be on crutches with a big brace/cast shoe on his lower left foot and leg because of a recent injury. We'd make it work.
We headed back to the B Span flats more out of curiosity than anything. But, I didn't like what I saw. We had a big wind, already, and the tide was way out, forcing us to get out on the hard, bare bottom to get to the needed depth. With hard bottom and no seaweed for cover, I just couldn't see it working. We gave it a quick few minutes, and with nothing alive showing in the net, moved on. My friends from Friday, Alan, Jack, and John, would follow.
We headed to the flats near Flamingo where I'd finally scored beautiful bait the day before, and went to work. The bait didn't come as quickly as on Friday, but it came, and once we figured out the wind and current, were about loaded up by the time Alan got there. They went to work a short distance away, but were getting no bait. I haled him over to our chum line, and kept Alex chumming until they could get reset. We cleaned up and bid them farewell for the day. But, I found out that night that they didn't get bait. I can't explain that one!
We had a great bite at our first stop for a while, in spite of the wind, which was southeast. Tom Jr. slammed in that hole with a trout, redfish, and several snook, as well as one snapper, one ladyfish, and one keeper snook. Tom and Tom also caught snook, although it was very hard for Tom Sr. to fish from the rear of the boat sitting down. This is standup and run around fishing when you've got a fish on. But, he was mostly content to be wetting a line and watching the boys catch fish.
Once things slowed we moved on, and again found ourselves in fish. This time it was snook first, followed by gag grouper. Alex still had the hot rod, but Tom Jr. caught his share, and I think Tom Sr. got one or two.
I was really concerned about the wind kicking to the mid-20's out of the south, and catching us on the east side of the Sound. It would be a very tough trip home. I suggested to Tom that we think about calling it a little early, especially since we'd thus far had a great day, and had their dinner goals and Slam in the well. He was in agreement.
We moved on to what would be the last stop of the day in the McKeever Keys. I chummed a patch of shoreline very hard, and finally got some fish popping the baits. But, it was hard to get them to go ahead and eat. We did catch a couple more snook, missed a couple, and boated one nice redfish about 24 inches long. With the wind gradually increasing, we headed toward home around one o'clock. It had been a great, fun day with the Jordan gang, and the boys had done a great job of following my instructions and adapting to this very foreign way of fishing.
That was the week. A long one. As I sit writing this we've got a big front moving in on us. It could bring winds in the 50's, and is almost certain to blow Monday and Tuesday right off the calendar. The forecast for Monday is wind to 30 MPH, so that's a no-brainer!
