Yesterday was a crazy day of fishing. Mark and his brother in-law from California, also a Mark, joined me for a fun morning of fishing. Mark and I went fishing more than 5 years ago, when I still had my Mitzi Skiff. He and his wife had an excellent day back then catching a lot of big redfish. Crazy it’s been that long since we went out last. Hopefully after yesterday we can make this a regularly occurring outing.
The weather was absolutely beautiful, but conditions were less than favorable. We are on the back side of a full moon, with an incredibly strong outgoing tide, clear high-pressure skies, and a ton of traffic out there. Medium water levels quickly disappeared and we were left with a negative low tide. Unable to fish the mangroves we had to resort to fishing the creeks and deeper water to start the day. I should have known it was going to be a tough morning considering how hard it was to get bait!
They wanted to keep some fish for dinner, so we set our sights on catching a limit of trout. I am conservationist at heart and find it hard to want to kill fish. I can’t stress enough the importance of catch and release, and only taking what you need. Started the morning in a creek, but quickly came to the realization that the current was much too strong. We could keep our bait in position and even weights didn’t seem to help. Got out of there before the tide got too low and hit an oyster bar that is usually loaded with trout. Nothing! We worked that entire bar and only caught a few lady fish. Funny because a few days before I wrecked the trout there.
I was out scouting around and throwing artificial lures and caught a dozen big trout from 18 to 22 inches on 4 different lures at the same location. Yesterday, not a fish to be found. They were fishing white bait and I was throwing some lures and couldn’t get a bite. We left there and went to a deep-water canal that usually has a bunch of fish. For the next hour we only caught catfish and ladyfish. Crazy because the same day I went scouting I hit that area and caught trout reds and snook.
We slowly worked our way up and eventually we caught a nice trout around 16 inches. Then another, and another. Doubled up a few times and ended up catching our limit of trout that next hour or so. We boated close to 20 trout that were between 15 and 19 inches. Once we got our limit, we fished a little longer to upgrade a few of the smaller trout we had. Plus, some underrated monster ladyfish. Big lady fish are a blast to catch, the smash baits very hard, they jump, pull hard and swim fast.
With an hour left in the trip I said let’s go hit one more spot and see if we can’t get a redfish or a snook to bite. At that point the tide was very low so the fish could only be if a few places. Tucked back into the creeks or out off the edge of the flats. There was hardly any water on the flat, so we posted up on the edge and tossed out a few pinfish. I started chumming the white bait that I had left over. As we watched for about 10 minutes, we started to see the fish push around and react to the chummers.
In that sort of situation, I like to bomb out baits as far as I can get them. Stick the rods in the rod holder and let Rodney do the work. Rodney the rod holder. Best fishermen on the boat. He never panics! Mark and “Other Mark”, as I was calling him, were getting jumpy at the twitching pinfish. I had to tell them to relax and just watch. The had the tendency to try and set the hook all morning, so using the rod holders was the best option. Every twitch the want to jump up and grab the rod. Then boom, the first rod goes off. Redfish on! It was a nice upper slot redfish.
Soon after another rod goes off, and another rod goes off. One rod got hammered and a big slot snook jumps out of the water and throws the hook. That last half hour we landed 6 redfish from 26 to 30 inches and two decent snook. We also had 3 or 4 baits get absolutely mangled by a redfish smashing it, but didn’t get the hook up. I only wish I had more time to fish, but I had to get off the water, clean the fish and get home in time to pick my son up from school. Family first!!
We have a quick but major cold front coming in on Monday. Its going to be blowing 20 to 30 mph and get down into the high 30’s and low 40s. With temperature highs around 58 to 65 degrees. That should push a lot of the fish around and march the closer to their winter holds. No telling what it will do to the bait fish. Good chance the bait fish move off of the flats and out to deeper water. That’s no fun when you are trying to net bait in 10 to 20 feet of water around the bridges with moving water.
If you are looking to get out on the water I have plenty of availability for the rest of November. Unfortunately, this has been one of the slowest Novembers that I have ever had. Not sure if it has a lot to do with this government shut down and flight being canceled. Also, everyone that seems to be calling is looking for a deal. Booking sites and guides willing to run for less are killing the industry, but I will remain steadfast with my determination and strong work ethics.
Fishing is fun. Capt. Bucky Goldman of Bag’Em Fishing Charters.