I stumbled to the office still half asleep Thursday morning at 4:00 AM, and fired up the computer. Soon I had a couple of weather sites loaded and I was looking at clear radar. Good. I got ready for the trip, and as I pulled into the ramp at 5:15 AM it began to rain. It rained for over an hour, and there were cells close by that were making lightning. A handful of people came and went. We stayed put. Finally, we headed out at around 6:30, on our way to Chino Island for bait. We were already way off schedule. We had a nine hour outgoing tide that had begun before 6 AM. I knew the best fishing would be very early.
As we neared York Island we again had rain, and the big cell was making more lightning. I circled back to St. James City and we sat and watched the weather for a while near the Waterfront Restaurant. We finally arrived at the Chino flats at around 7 AM. I was not happy about being over an hour late getting to the bait grounds.
My customers were John Maini, and his long-time friend Mike, from New York. They were referred to me by my old friend and customer Elliot Danto. I sure wanted to deliver a trip that would measure up to Ell's billing and their expectations, but I knew the weather was wrecking my plans.
The weather brought with it strong south wind, which would make the beaches unfishable, and the passes rough. And, that's where most of the snook are, right now. By the time we had loaded up on bait, we had several big cells of weather building just off shore, and all making electricity. My concern is always "safety first", and the weather dictated for me that we would stay within easy striking distance of someplace to hide if the weather blew up on us.
As we prepared to head to the east side of the Sound to try to keep some distance between us and the weather, we noticed a bunch of fish crashing bait a couple hundred yards away. The guys ask me what they were, to which I replied that they would be either jack crevalle, ladyfish, or speckled trout, or a mixture of all. I asked if they wanted to play with them for a while and find out what they were, or move on in pursuit of snook and redfish. They wanted to play a bit.
The baits were eaten about as quick as they hit the water. It turned out to indeed be a mix of jacks, ladyfish, and trout. John and Mike caught about half dozen trout and half dozen jacks, and a ladyfish. We put the ladyfish and a trout into the well. We'd use the ladyfish for redfish bait later. And, after that quick round of fun, the guys decided they'd like to move on in search of snook and reds.
We headed to the first snook stop of the day, keeping a sharp eye on the weather. The weather cells were now moving, and we'd no more than gotten set up on our spot, and the breeze shifted, pulling us off of it. We managed a couple of hits, but didn't manage to hook anything. We moved on.
It was after nine o'clock by the time we arrived at our next stop, and the tide had moved out noticeably. We wouldn't have all that long to indulge in shallow water fishing. The first couple of spots were duds, except for one snook. Oh, the fish were there, but they were having nothing to do with us. All we got were scaled baits. Finally, at the third spot we put out a piece of cut ballyhoo and steaked ladyfish along with a live shiner. We were looking for redfish. But, our first fish on the cut bait was a snook that ate the cut ballyhoo. A little later Mike caught a nice redfish that ate a ladyfish steak. I figured that once we got that first red to eat, we'd manage to catch a few, but they just wouldn't eat. Catfish was the only thing interested on the slow outgoing tide.
By now it was moving on toward noon, and we had several large, threatening cells coming at us. Both were making lots of lightning, and my little lightning detector was making lots of noise. We decided to head toward home and fish some spots that would allow us to get home quickly if the weather got ugly. But, it was more of the same. We had some hits, and some scaled baits, but couldn't get anything to the boat. Finally, about out of bait and getting low on body fluids, we headed for the ramp.
It had been a fun day with two very nice guys, but it had not been what I had hoped to deliver because of the weather. I never got to follow my game plan, which meant we were trying to catch the few resident snook that stay on the flats during the summer instead of migrating. And we were trying to catch them on a tough tide. But, we had gone and returned safely, and that's most important.
Next week we have some good looking tides on the new moon. Tides will be about as good as it gets during the dog days of summer. I have three trips next week. Hopefully, there will be some good fishing to talk about then.