Redfish Redemption

Over the last few weeks we have been 4 or 5 times without seeing or catching a redfish. October is famous for the best month to catch redfish. So today, we decided to fish for redfish and snook in Centipede Bay. The tide was falling which that is strike one, going back in to Centipede bay on a falling tide with a late afternoon low tide, could mean the fishing trip turns in to a camping trip.

Since we where short on time, I decided not to head to Bayport to catch whitebait. Instead we could pick up a dozen mud minnows on the way back to the Centipede Bay. Fortunately the tide was just low enough to get the mud minnows of the banks of the island.

After sitting for about 20 min. one of the rods bent over. My first though was that it was a catfish, since victories have been somewhat difficult lately. As it turns out, to my surprise it was a trout. Not what I wanted but much better than a catfish. At this point I thought I may never catch another redfish.

A few minutes later we saw a snook cruising along the rock bar we were fishing. The rod doubled over and the snook started jumping. However there was one very unsettling component of this fight. While the snook was jumping of the port side side of the boat, this line was still going out toward the boa of the boat. That's right the line was caught under a rock, so the snook was fighting the rock and I was fighting the rock. I was hoping the rock would give up, but after a minute or two the leader gave up.

Fortunately, a few minutes after I lost the snook, I saw a big school of redfish moving over the rock bar. Finally my redfish redemption! The first fish must have trained for triathlon, and I thought the fish would be over slot. After several long runs and a couple passes under the boat (the water is only 6 inches deep) the fish was safely in the net. Lucky the fish measured a solid 26 1/2 inches. Yeah, redfish for dinner!
After that we caught a 29 redfish and released it. The next was a 20, since the bite was on we decided to release that one in hopes of a redfish a little bigger. The next one was 26 3/4 and it went in the box.

The little 20 inch

Over Size Redfish.. by 2 inches...
And away it goes....
Our second dinner guest.

To top the day off, as we headed in the Hernando Beach Channel, I saw a large school of whitebait, just be for the turn marker.

It was nice to have a day of redfish redemption!

Good Luck
Zippyjr

Tide : Falling 0.04 5:01pm
Water Clarity : Clear
Moon Phase: 34% full
Temp: 92 F
Water Temp : 85F
Wind: 5-10 mph SE : 10-12 mph W
Bait: Mud Minnows
Results: 4 Redfish, 1 Trout and an auto release snook.

Snook Season Is Approaching.

In a week snook season will open for the Gulf and it could not come soon enough. Earlier today my neighbor reported 3 nice size snook cruising past his dock. Almost every trip I took out to the Hernando Beach channel I ran across several snook, some over slot size. Over the past summer we encountered a great snook feeding frenzy. Based on the reports this should be a pretty good fall for snook.

Bait:

• Live bait: White bait, pin fish, sand perch, ballyhoo and shrimp work well
• Lures: Long A boomer, Yo-Zuri Crystal Minnow, D.O.A. and MirrOlure.

Live bait of course is the best bet for snook fishing. Lures work well but are a lot of work.

Finding snook:

The easiest place to find snook would be the Hernando Beach channel. Day time fishing is best early or late in the day. You really can not fish on weekends, due to boat traffic, unless you fish at night. Night fishing is not for everyone and if you are not an avid boater and have good night vision, then you really should not attempt night fishing. At night the Hernando Beach channel becomes a very different place and at times pretty spooky. The best nights to fish is Sunday and Monday since many of the shrimpers take those day off. When I fish at night, I start out near market 3 then work my way back in. This way I have the back drop of the Hernando Beach lights to provide me with shadows of the cuts and islands help guide me. I also have every cut marked on my GPS and night vision goggles help out too. The snook tend to hang around the north side of the channel near the cuts and on the backside of the cuts at marker 23 out to marker 3.

Other good place for day time snook fishing is Centipede bay, its more of a challenge to find them, since there is a lot of area to cover. The snook tend to stay in deep in the creeks or in where the water runs fast and they are very spooky. Most of the time they start to move out before you can even get close. The way I solved this problem, is when ever I see a snook, I make a mental note of the location and tide phase. When I go back out to fish for snook, I first look at the area and see if there is anyway to keep the grass or a small island between me and the area I want to fish. This way I can see the fish from the casting platform, but the fish can not see the boat. One important note, if you move around they will see you standing, so when you make a cast make sure it is with as little movement as possible. Most of the time a simple pitch works. When sight fishing for snook live bait is a must. With the amount of effort it takes to sneak up on snook you don't want to risk your one shot with a lure that may spook the snook as soon as the lure hits the water.

Going south around dinner point is also a good place to look for snook. The water is very shallow, so don't venture there on a falling tide. Unless you packed a tent. The snook tend to hang just inside the many creeks in the area. White bait works great in this area, anchor up near the mouth of the creek a chum with live white bait. If the fish are there you will know it with in a few minutes. Typically if I fish that area, I also plan on fishing Aripeka. From Aripeka south you can find plenty of snook, trout and redfish.

Tackle:
You will want to use a 7 ft med action rod and matching reel. A good drag system is a must. I use a Shimano Stradic 2500 spooled up with moss green 15# power pro. I use about 3 feet of 30# fluorocarbon tied to the power pro with a uni to uni knot. Depending on the bait size will determine the what size live bait hook I use. I tend to use the smallest hook I can. If you plan on bait and wait fishing, you should use a circle hook. Only use live bait hook when you know you will be able to set the hook when the fish hits. This will reduce the number of gut hooked fish.

Even through I use 15# power pro, I typically only use 2 or 3 lbs of drag. Snook have a soft mouth (not as soft as trout) and many anglers lose fish due to the hook pulling. Take your time, wear out the fish and enjoy the challenge. Just make sure you properly handle and revive the snook before you release them. Take a look at the Floida Sea Grant web site on proper fish handling


Good Luck
Zippyjr.

Trout fishing in the cuts

The weather has been bad, for the last week or so. This morning we had some big thunder storms then it cleared up nicely, so I decided that I would go trout fishing around 10am.

Live well full of bait.

Since I knew the whitebait was in the Hernando Beach Channel, I figured it would be a quick stop for bait then hit the cuts. I found bait at the first turn in the channel.

Whitebait on the other side of the cut.

On the way out just before the first turn, I saw two big snook laying in against the bank. I thought about going back and fishing for snook, but there was a bit of boat traffic in the channel.

I saw more bait at marker 19 and decided to make that my first stop. I had a couple a strikes and lost a few hooks, I would guess is was Spanish mackerel. So I move out to the marker 3 and saw a couple of tarpon about 75# each chasing bait. I tossed out a bait but the where not interested. Of course I was not really too interested, since I only had 10# mono and 20# leader, it would have been a short fight.

I fished each cut back to marker 9. I saw trout and redfish swimming around and tossed out some bait. I lost on bait on a rock, which the only redfish I saw went over and ate the bait that I just broke off. So I'm sure the redfish felt the hook and headed out to try to dislodge the hook. A short while later I caught the first trout. I fished there for about an hour and picked up 4 trout and couple of catfish and ladyfish. The trout did not hit the bait aggressively, rather they slowly nibbled at it. I had several trout pop the top of the water only to allow the bait to get away. I also saw the tarpon rolling in the channel near marker 10.


Over a good short day fishing....

Storms Brewing Inland

Turned out to be a very nice day.

Tide : Raising 3.5H @ 2:57pm
Water Clarity : Clear
Moon Phase: Waning Gibbous 89% full
Temp: 88 F
Water Temp : 82 F
Wind: 0-5 v mph
Bait: Whitebait
Results: 4 trout

Full Moon

One of the benefits of this blog is that I can keep track of my fishing trips. While my last trip was not really a regular fishing trip, I did check with a few others anglers in area. All the reports I heard where the same. We saw fish but they would need bite. This pattern seems to occur around the the full moon.

We left at the top of the tide which makes it difficult to catch mud minnows and we really did not have time to catch whitebait, but I did net a few pin fish. When using live bait you can tell when there is something close by that the bait fears. This did happen a couple of time and I did see a couple swirls around the bait.As well as seeing several redfish in the area. The anglers that I did talk where seasoned, so I would have to take them as valid reports. A few more full moon reports like the past reports and I will have to conclude that during the daylight hours the redfish and snook do not feed aggressively if at all around the full moon.

The next step will be to see how the redfish and snook feed at night around the full moon. That was the plan for this full moon but the storms are not falling into the summer weather pattern, maybe next month.

Any comments on inshore fishing around the full moon I would love to here them.

Good Luck
Zippyjr

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Tide : Falling 3.5 @ 1:19pm
Water Clarity : Clear
Moon Phase: 100% full
Temp: 87 F
Water Temp : 78F
Wind: 10 WSW mph
Bait: Pin Fish
Results: Boat Ride

Snook Attack

Today a friend was visiting and wanted to go catch a few redfish. We headed out of Jenkins creek so we could pick up some whitebait on the way. We checked the area around the first turn maker and did not see any so we headed to tri-pod, nothing but big ballyhoo and pin fish. Checked smith rock, nothing. Went back to the turn marker and finally found 3 pods of bait. Over the last few weeks the turn marker is the only place I have found bait.

Once we loaded up with bait, we headed back to Centipede Bay. We spend too much time hunting bait and now the tide had turned. We only had about an hour to fish in the bay and hooked up with two redfish and lost them both! (That's called and auto release...)

The next up was the Hernando Beach Channel in the "cuts". The cuts are the deep reliefs between the rock piles that protect the channel from filling in with sand. I see many anglers there most seem to understand how to fish this area,. Today there was a couple of guys fishing and they anchored up in the middle of the cuts. This is where we catch fish, as you can image they left with out catching anything.

There is about 20 "cuts" along the north side of the channel

The place to anchor is about here and fish between the rocks

We moved from cut to cut tossing out live chum at each stop. One cut down from where the other guys where fishing, there was a big response from the chum. We could not tell what they where, but I suspected that they must have green backs that blended in well with the sea grass on the bottom. The one fish that size with a greenish back is a snook. We pitched a couple of baits with hooks and both of us hooked in to big snook.

The first pair broke off since I had trouble releasing the anchor and fighting the fish to give chase. The next one, I was ready and released the anchor and off we went. I use a trolling motor to chase the fish so it will not spook the other fish. We came back to the anchor thinking that we must have spooked the fish. Only to find another big response to the live chum. This went on for about an hour, then everything stopped. We ended up releasing 5 snook all the 10-12# range. The one draw back to this kind of actions is no one wants to stop and get the camera out to take pictures... Maybe one day I'll get a helmet cam...

The next cut we caught a couple of trout for dinner and decided it was time to call it a good day.

Good Luck
Zippyjr

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Tide : Falling : H 3.0 10:01 am : L 0.40 6:21pm
Water Clarity : Clear
Moon Phase: 78% full waxing gibbous
Temp: 78F
Water Temp : 85F
Wind: 5mph SE morning- 10mph W afternoon.
Bait: Whitebait (green backs, greenies)
Results: 5 Snook release - 2 Red Fish (auto release) - 2 trout

Gulf Snook Season: Closed

Snook season is closed for the Gulf side! I had hoped to snook fish the last day of the season. But my boat trailer had different plans and had me running all over Hernando county getting parts to keep the axle from falling off. And now the weekend is here and my daughter has more projects for me than my wife. That is unfortunate, but when duty calls you have to answer (or else)!

This year I have seen and caught more snook than any other year and most anyone I talk to that fish for snook agrees. Unfortunately for my snook loving taste buds the snook that I did catch where over or under slot limit size. But if it helps the snook fishery then I am all for it.
The local marine biologist had told me he saw 200+ snook back in Jenkins creek in late January of this year. With that I would have to guess that this will be the year of the snook and I'll have to wait until Sept. for grilled snook.

FYI: I was verbally flogged for holding the pictured snook by the lower jaw. I was told never hold any fish by the lower jaw if it is to be released. The reason is; their lower jaw can become dislocated and/or their internal organs rearranged. While the fish looks fine when released, if the jaw is dislocated it could starve over the few weeks and die. For more information you can check out UF's catch and release web site.

Good Luck