Saddling Up To The Oyster Bar

10.28.10
Water: 78 Deg
Air: 80's and humid
Wind: calm
Tide: last half of outgoing

We decided to go out and give it a quick try after the fog burnt off this morning.  The idea was to get out before the wind and rain rolled in (which we did) and get in before the low tide made it difficult to get the Nan back on the trailer (which we didn't).

Headed out to the oyster bars at the mouth of the OR.

Nancy hooked up right away with the ol' Cajun Thunder with a Trigger X shrimp.  It was a nice 21" trout, one of the nicer ones she has caught this year.

I decided to just fish my bonk a donks today.  The topwater, which I have had good success with and my new bonk a donk SS, which is an under water retrieve.

I caught a little red on it.  And after making another pass, hooked up on this nice trout.  The hooks are really sharp on this little lure, as there is still blood in the boat this morning (mine not his).

This little lure is dynamite.  I hooked up on a couple of others, but they pulled off.  

We went over to the 20 marker and Nancy caught another little trout and we decided to go back in and load the boat as the tide was getting pretty low.

That decision ended up with a trailer backed over the end of the ramp, me wading out to my chest, lifting the stuck trailer out of the water and getting help from some nice guys at the ramp winching the Nan onto the trailer without the trailer being in the water.

Glad it's a light metal boat.

It was a pretty productive 2 hour trip, although, in the end, quite wet.

RED (grouper) OCTOBER

10.21.10
Tide: very low to high tide (full moon)
Water: mid to hi 70's very clear
wind: N 15 mph to 5 mph late
2 footers leveling off to calm late

Me and my Broski Doug headed out to try and chase down some grouper and try and get our lines stretched.
The day started out very choppy with winds blowing form the north.  We had hopes that if we kind of wandered out slowly the winds would lay, so the weather report said.  (And they were right for once)!
We headed out to 2 flat with the idea to try a couple of drifts and get whatever would bite, and some pinfish.  I was hoping for some bull reds, but Doug hooked up on two nice spanish.

I managed a few pinfish.

We headed over to Rotary reef, but could only manage a few small rockies while trolling.

As the water tried to calm down, I figured we could start heading out to the big water. We decided to try and head out to the spot Nancy and I slayed them a couple of weeks ago.

As we approached the area of the 26 marker, I knew that we weren't gonna venture out to the really big water today, as the water was pretty rough for the Nan Z.

So, I headed east to a few places I had on the ol' GPS.
We started at my place I call "Coral" and caught a bunch of small rockies, one keeper.

Next was a slow troll towards "Yank Wreck".  Got a couple more rockies. We trolled over the wreck and I could see fish on the fish finder, but no takers.

We got up on the wreck and as soon as we let our baits down, it was on.
Red (grouper) October indeed.

We caught them as fast as we could get our bait down.  Grouper after grouper coming aboard for a look.  We caught some that had already eaten our baits. Adding insult to us, they would spit them up in the boat.

Doug with The Biggest Red of the Day

As the bite died there, we moved to our "good" hole about a 1 1/2 away and again. We were led there by a group of 4 dolphins that swam along with us. As soon as we got down, fish were coming up.

Again the red grouper were tearing it up.

We also caught a few gags and blacks during the day, but the reds led the way.

We had a beautiful ride back to the hill as the wind layed and seas turned calm.  We were watching all of the Monarch butterflies heading to Mexico.
On the ride home, we saw probably a hundred of them.

Doug got to go home with a cooler full of grouper and rock bass.  He did leave a few for me and Nancy.  He's a nice brother.

Afternoon Delight

10.17.10

Wind: S 10 mph

Air: high 70's

Water: 72

Tide: outgoing to low

Water: clear

Went out to try and catch a bull red at the mouth of the OR.  We had netted some small LY's a couple of weeks ago and now were gonna try them out.

Just caught a small Black Sea Bass at the mouth of the river so we decided to go down to the sand trout hole at the entry to Panacea Harbor.

Saw Captain Vic anchored up down there.  His boat started catching them kind of regular, and he yelled "Come on over here boys!".  So, we slid in behind his boat.  He said he wasn't catching them real well today either.

But, we did manage to pull out a few sand trout for dinner Monday.  Also a blue, some croakers and this pretty Black Tip Shark that Nancy caught on her last cast.

It was a Chamber of Commerce day!

Nan Z and the Overfished Red Snapper

Seas: 1 foot or less
Water temp: high 70's
Tide: outgoing the incoming.  Very high tides
Air: mid 80's



The seas have layed down for the week and we decided to take advantage of the extended red snapper season.  Florida has opened up the snapper season for 8 weekends because the oil spill kept the snapper from being "overharvested" due to the banning of the commercial fleet fishing in the Gulf.

We headed out to a snapper waypoint I had plugged in to the GPS from a tip from Fred.  It is about 6 miles SW of K tower.

The water was beautiful.

We reached our waypoint in and hour and 20 minutes.

The first drop I hooked into a fish that couldn't be budged off the bottom and he got off.

We then fished around the hole, and marked a lot of fish, but kept getting our bait stolen.  We decided to expand the area and trolled a mann's stretch 25.  We hooked up on a nice King Mac.  We didn't mark any nice spots to fish, so we headed back to our original waypoint.

Needing some luck, I fired up a cigar.  Works every time, and the first drop brought up an very nice "overfished" 5.5 lb. red snapper.

We had our bait stolen a few more times and decided to head back to the hill.  As we headed back I ran across some unusual activity on the fish finder in 60 feet of water.  We turned around and dropped some sardines into the water and soon it was on.  It was a feeding frenzy of red, black and gag grouper.  Also, another Red Snapper.

It was an was an Advil moment as we were doubled up with nice fish about every drop.  I caught the biggest black I have landed to date.  Also, caught a keeper red grouper and a keeper gag.
Nancy laid down her tackle as the exhaustion of catching fish and Dramamine took over.

We got back to the hill in an hour and 10 minutes as the seas were laid down.

Just a great day to be on the water.

Manatee Siting

10.8.11

Air: low 80's. clear
Wind: NW 5-10mph
Tide: rushing in


Went out fishing with our neighbor Ron.  He is trying to learn the area and wanted some help.  We took his boat and headed out to the clam bar.  The tide was rolling in, as we are experiencing spring tides.
As we drifted across the shallow sand, I could see something dark moving in the water about 50 yards away.  We then heard something surface and exhale near the boat.
We looked back and a manatee was playing with the shrimp bucket.

He stayed with the boat until we decide to leave and head to the sand trout hole in front of Panacea Harbor.

The fishing report is: sand trout are stacked in the sand trout hole.  We brought home 8.  We anchored among 4 boats and everyone had bent boat syndrome.

Cornucopia of Fish on Yom Kippur

9.18.10
Air: high 80's
Water: 85
Wind: 10 mph SE
Waves: 1-2 and some 3's early with chop
Tide incoming and start of outgoing

In celebration of my Jewish ways, we decided to go get our rods bent on Yom Kippur.

Nancy said she can't remember who many different fish she caught.  A rundown follows:

Pinfish
Pufferfish
Red Grouper
Black Grouper
Gag Grouper
Blue Runner
Sea Trout
Black Seabass
Tomtate: Brown Grunt
Pink Mouth Snapper: White Grunt
Ladyfish
Sand Perch
Remora (got off)
Lizardfish

I think I got them all.

We really left them biting. The tide was going out hard around 1 pm and the grouper had turned on.  We were fishing our GPS spot marked "Good".  And it was.

We broke off on our last two drops, ran out of bait and headed to the hill.
Caught this dark Gag free lining a grunt. I was surprised that a grouper would come up to a free lined bait.  We had gotten hung up and I was backing the boat up to free the snagged rod and suddenly the clicker started screaming on the free lined rod.  This fish put up a nice fight on the light weight bait caster.

We started getting the reds as the tide turned. This is one of many that made it boat side.

The water had laid a little by then.  It was a rock and rolling affair earlier in the day.

The water was very clear again.  As we were boating back to the hill, you could see bottom in 16 feet of water.

60 Year Old Catches Sand Trout!

9.11.10
Temp. HOT!
Water Temp: 86
Winds: calm
Tide: Outgoing and fast

60 year old Nancy caught a sand trout today!

She caught this beauty on a Gulp white shrimp in the sand trout hole in front of Panacea Harbor.  Nancy also caught her usually assortment of pooping ladyfish and some smaller trout.

We headed out this morning on a very fast outgoing tide.  We put in at Panacea Harbor due to the very low tide expected around noon when we planned on coming back in.

We were greeted with a hot humid morning but a very pretty sunrise.  This pelican was getting ready for the hot day by checking us out as we headed to the fishing grounds.

I had heard that the reds were in Elmore Bay, so we decided to try it first and see if any were there.
The bait was everywhere and the tide was running fast out of the creeks.

I made a cast at the second creek we came to and heard the unmistakable sound of red taking my bonkadonk on top.  It was a nice 21" red.

After fishing the next creek with no results we headed out to the barrel.  Soon the bonkadonk was history as a shark came up and ate it.  After a spirited battle he won and I lost a lure that had caught a lot of fish this year.

I tied on another topwater lure I had purchased made by Bomber.  It was promptly swallowed up by a big red but he kept getting unbuttoned after repeated attacks.  Thrilling, but no fish.

We then headed out to Shell Pt. reef and caught 3 or 4 trout there.  I caught a 16" on a senko after seeing how to use them on trout the night before on the "Flats Class" tv show.  Sweet.

We headed over towards Piney Island to see if any tarpon were hanging around.  We got to the area where the water suddenly goes from 8 feet deep to 3 feet deep and saw some schooling ladyfish.  We threw in the mix and quickly hooked up on a nice trout on a red head/white body Yozuri flash minnow.  As I was bringing the fish to the boat a sudden HUGE explosion of water occurred.  There was a monster fish trying to eat the trout about half way back to the Nan.   I kept pulling it away (scared) an the fish kept attacking the hooked trout all the way to the boat.  Water from his attack was splashing in the boat.  I was afraid this monster may jump in the boat and knowing a fish over  100 lbs. flopping in the boat would be a mess, I was kind of relieved after he took the struggling trout from me.

Tarpon or Shark?  I don't know, but I didn't see the tell tale fin of a shark, so I'm thinking a huge tarpon.

Headed over to the sand trout hole where Nancy is shown with her birthday trout and soon saw some tarpon rolling there.  Decided to try and troll one up.  No luck, so we went back to the barrel for one more try on the low tide as the sun was now driving sweat into your eyeballs.

I caught 3 trout there on a gulp shrimp.

We headed to the hill, knowing that there are some monster fish in the lake!

Headed to Tally for Nancy's hot dog birthday dinner.

High Class!