Five Bite Cigar

12.29.11

Lake Jackson

Air: 60's
Water: High 50's

Hunter wanted to go back bass fishing before he headed back to Charleston.  We decided to go back to Lake Jackson to attempt another outing like our last one there.

We knew it would be tougher with the bluebird skies that greeted us in the morning.

We tried power fishing the hay mounds that we caught them on a week ago, but to not avail.  We proceed to the north west side of the lake and found some old lilly pad stick ups.

We were needing some bites, so I picked up ol' reliable.  A nice dry cigar I had brought from the house.  I have learned from fishing past tournaments that if the bite was slow, the only way to get it going was to fire up a big stinky.

Sure enough the cigar magic began.  

I caught a pike and had a bass miss my chatter bait.  We slowed down and started casting Zoom Ultra Vibe worms.

I finally slowed it down enough that the bites started to come regular.
This cigar was worth five bites that equaled a couple of three pounders and another pike.

The rest of the day I picked up bass pretty regular sprinkled with some pike in between.

Our count was around 8 bass, a bunch of break offs (not happy with my new 50 lb. test braid) and 3 pike.

Hunter requested I not post his catch for reasons that only we know.  Hint (I had one of those days, and he didn't).

We released two more to a secret pond.  Here are the release pictures, as we hope to create our own bass honey hole.

Joining his friends

Going into a nice clear lake

Still VERY frisky

Granny and Her Fish

12.27.11

My Mom is down spending a few months in her new digs at Bayside Villas.
After much prodding she finally got down to the nice dock that is part of the community.
I told her the only reason to be on the Forgotten Coast is to fish and drink beer.
You can tell by her grins that she is finally getting the idea.

Santa Delivers Sand Trout On Christmas Eve

12.24.11

Tide: Incoming to High

Christmas Eve brought Hunter, Doug and I together for a trip out to the Ochlockonee River mouth.

We headed over to Chaires Creek with two dozen shrimp and some gulp and tried to duplicate the good fishing adventure we had the last trip out.  But, as usual, it is tough to duplicate the previous trip if the tide isn't working the same as the last time.  This time the tide came in late and just kind of hovered at high.  We used up a bunch of shrimp feeding little fellas on the bottom.  I did manage to put one keeper speckled sea trout in the box.

So, as the wind layed and the tide slackened, we headed over to fish in front of the 24 marker and try for sand trout.  The river rushes through there so hard, most of the time we don't fish it.  But, the conditions were right to drop 3/8 oz. jig heads tipped with gulp shrimp down to the bottom.  We were quickly on the sand trout where the bottom came from 28 feet up to 20 feet.

These were some of the nicest sand trout we have caught.  Hunter got us going with this one which was one of the smaller ones we caught.  (except for Doug, who caught some about the size of his gulp.)

The size of the mouth on these guys show they can eat about anything you drop down.

Doug started whacking them too.

As the sun set we were thinking of the times gone by and the presents we used to get at Christmas.  They included old cotton insulated underwear, green hunting boots that accelerated your freezing feet and blue jeans that seamed to be always frozen down by your shoes.

Here at the Forgotten Coast, that time was way behind us!

Lake Jackson Winter Solstice Bassin'

12.22.10

Lake Jackson

Water: WAAAAYYYY Down

Wind: raging out of the south

Temp: 70's

Hunter and I wanted to do some bassin' on the first day of winter.  It just felt like it, warm, humid wind howling, foggy.  Yep, that's winter.

I heard from my friend that they were catching some nice bass IF you could get your boat in at Lake Jackson.  We took a chance, and after some maneuvering around the boat ramp, we got the tin Nan in the lake.

We just put the trolling motor down and started slingin' and bringing' a Chatterbait, a Zoom Ultra Vibe and a Skinny Dipper throughout the weeds and coots on Lake Jackson.

Soon Hunter said he missed one and then I got in the action with a jack pike on the Chatterbait.

Then Hunter caught a nice little bass and then followed up with this nice fish.

We caught a few more smaller bass and then I connected on this 2 and half pounder.

The bite was consistent in the wind and fog.  I missed a really nice fish on the chatter bait and then set the hook on this really nice fish, tipping the scales at 5 1/2 lbs.

Hunter stabbed another bass and the sun broke out and the bite tailed.

After some creative boat loading skills, we headed home happy bassers.

New Tune!

12.21.11

Hey, I've added a new fishing tune for your viewing/listening pleasure.
Click on the tune to the right of my posts and see what you think of Taj!!

Chaires Creek Whackfest

12.20.11

Tide: Outgoing

Well Hunter is home for the Holidays and, as is the case when he arrives, we start catching fish.

We decided on an afternoon trip over to Chaires Creek.  After receiving some fishing advice (thanks Taff) we launched at Mashes Sands and eased over to Chaires.

The mouth of the creek was covered with oysterman plying their trade.  I learned today they can make a little over $200 a day raking the oysters.  A lot of hard work, but pretty good paycheck over a week's time.

We slid past them and started anchoring up around the creek's oyster bars.

It didn't take long until we had a small trout.

  We started moving up and down the creek.  We hit an oyster bar back in the creek and caught a 4-5 puppy redfish.

After the oysterman started clearing out we eased back towards there oyster bars and the trout and flounder started biting pretty good.

Nancy was on fire with her shrimp draggin'.

Hunter and Nancy doubled up on a flounder and a trout.

We put three nice keeper trout in the box.  I was also in on the action throwing a white gulp shrimp on a jig head.  I was fishing where ever they would let me cast.  We landed well over a dozen trout.

Hunter and Nancy were down to their last shrimp as we were preparing to leave.

They finished with this real nice flounder and trout.

We headed back to the hill with panko fish fry sandwiches waiting for us after the boat clean up and fish cleaning session.

Nancy Dials Them Up At Rotary Reef

12.6.11

Tide last of incoming and first of outgoing
Water Temp: high sixties

We took the Nan Z out for a run as the seas quieted finally.

Decided to got out to Rotary Reef for a quick trip.

The fish were biting as soon as we anchored up and dropped down.

The Black Sea bass were biting on every cast.  We kept a few for dinner and just enjoyed hooking them on light tackle.

Nancy was fishing under the boat wearing out the sea bass with shrimp.  She dropped down with some cut bait and soon I heard her drag screaming.
She brought up a beautiful over slot Redfish.

28" Redfish

We decided to give trolling a try.  The last couple of years we have done well dragging stretch 25's around the rocks.  We caught nothing trolling east, but each pass westbound had Nancy pulling in another gag.  All of these were right at 22 inches which would be a keeper if we were allowed to put them in the icebox.  But, the federal government have different ideas, and all were released.

We headed back in to Mashes Sands and stopped between the 7 and 8 marker and caught some sand trout and croakers to finish up a fish catching day!

So This is Catching and Not Fishing!

12.2.11

Tide:  Out going

My neighbor Taff said he would take me fishing in his home waters around Spring Creek when I could get in the boat.

I saw him earlier in the week and told him I was boat ready after fishing over Thanksgiving and not feeling too bad.

We went out Friday morning and as we approached the creek after a 15 minute boat ride, birds dropping down and feeding everywhere.

Its always a good sign that the birds have found the buffet open.

As we worked our way back into the creek by various maneuvers, we finally reached our first hole on a cool morning.

As I reached down to get my rod ready I realized my bail was broken on my Shimano.

So as I was rerigging my other rod, Taff put a whoopin' on the fish.  Three keeper reds, a pup and a sheepshead in five straight casts.  He looked at me and said, "We aint' fish in' today we're catching'!"

Man, was he right with that statement.

After I got my gear assembled again, we hit the next hole and I got some action as we brought aboard a few more keeper reds and probably 5 more pups.

We then went to the very back of the creek to the last hole.

We fished there for at least an hour, and caught well over 20 keeper reds and at least 30 pups.  I have never seen this before.  EVERY cast was a bite and we had many doubles and lines crossed.

We were tallying how many spots each red had.  Taff was winning with a five spot red until I caught a seven spot red.  Crummy picture below.

We finally decided to quit catching and run around and show me the sites of Spring Creek.

I watched as Taff pulled up to oyster bars to grab some treats.

Check out the size of the oysters he grabs!

This tour included the viewing of the 12 boils in Spring Creek, two alligators and a few small trout along the way.

Wow, this is what you call fishing (catching) paradise!

I couldn't ask for a better trip and a more educational trip than I received today.

Thanks Taff!

Up and Att'em

11-23-11 Through 11-28-11
Thanksgiving Weekend

Tides:  Crazy low to high

Finally!
I am able to get up and go out on the boat and fish.

In Front Of Panacea Harbor Marina

Had a big crew in for the holiday.
Patty and Willie from Sautee.  Doug and Mom in from Macedonia and Crystal River.  And Hunter was in from Charleston.  This visit kept the gas prices from going down.

Patty and Willie nailed them every other day while they were  fishing out of their canoe.

For me and whoever was unfortunate enough to go out with me, not so much.

Fish were caught around Panacea Harbor Marina and the oyster bars at the mouth of the Ochlockonee River.

Hunter, Doug and I fished up the Wakulla River for bass and only had a small flounder for our efforts.

Patty and Willie had much better luck.

Patty told me to mention that these fish were all caught by her and that Willie is just holding them!

All in all a very nice Thanksgiving visit.

This Is Gonna Take A While

10.26.11

Got back from the doc and she says I can lift 25 lbs. in three weeks.  Well, there goes pulling anchor.

Stay tuned, I'll be back in a month!

Post Operative Dock Trash with Hunter

10.16.11

Well, decided to walk like a 84 year old guy down to the dock and fish a little with Hunter who is in on fall break.

The surgery knocked me for a loop, but I gotta get around and Hunter and I figured we would try a few casts.

We caught a few reds, little trout and a flounder broke me off at the dock.

Fun being out with Hunter, when he leaves I will be able to rest my wounds.  He about killed me laughing at his stories and sly wit.

Dock Trash

10.8.11

It has been really, really windy the past few days.

So, I was banished to fish off the dock today, good ol' dock trash.  That's better than bank trash here.  It keeps you away from the bugs.

I ended up catching 5 little reds, two little trout and a lady.

Miette had fun watching the fish come in.  She really wanted to kill some saltwater fish today.  But, she had to be an onlooker.

Great Vitamin D Trips, Fishing Not So Great

9-30,10-2-2011

Windy, hot on 9-20
Cool, windy 10-2

With my upcoming hospital stay, I'm trying to get out and get on the grouper, unfortunately, all I'm getting is a good vitamin D infusion from the sun.

Nancy and I went down to Lanark to try some grouping in their pretty water.

The wind was quite brisk early, we got out about 4 miles and decided to turn the Nan Z around and head downwind of St. George Island.

We marked good live bottom on some new GPS numbers we got, but all we could put in the boat was a flounder and a bunch or black sea bass.

We didn't even get a good tug from a grouper.

A cool front came in Saturday and created small craft advisories.

We went out in front of Panacea Harbor late on Sunday to try and catch some sand trout.

We put a few in the boat, which Nancy is frying in panko as we speak.

But, the trip was still relatively slow, except for Nancy spanking the sharks!

Sea Bass Run

9.25.11

Air. Hot, heat index 102 deg.
wind very calm
water 86-88 deg.
Tide: low to high

We wanted to get out and try the open gag grouper season.  So we loaded up the Nan Z and headed out on a very hot calm morning.

We went to the last spot we caught some nice red grouper on when Patty and Willie were down.  Nothing.

Kept banging from spot to spot out toward 24 with nothing to show for it but a 18" red grouper and a few grunts.

But, the black sea bass are sure out there, and they are nice ones.  My graph kept lighting up when traveling from spot to spot.  We would drop down and get eaten up with the bass.

We kept enough to get 14 filets, but you could have loaded the boat if you wanted too.

So, while we were disappointed with the grouper catch, at least we got some groceries.

Check out the slick calm.  It was hot, hot, hot!!!

Ocholockonee River Combo

9.16.11

Air temp: low 80's
Water temp: 80
Tide: last few hours of outgoing

Well, you could tell they opened Gag Grouper season today.  We got the last parking spot at the ramp as the gas stations, bait shops and hotels were reaping the rewards of an open fishing season finally.

I had Nan Z down with a radio install, so we took out the tin Nan for some inshore fishing.

While it wasn't wide open, we did manage to get our rods bent a few times.
Nancy connected on a nice 16" flounder, a nice blue and I had a keeper red inhale my new spoon.

It was enjoyable to have a fresh wind and cooler temps as the fall season begins.

Pre Lee

9.5.11

air high 80's
water mid 80's
wind from the se and blowing

We decided to try and get out before TS Lee came in.  They are predicting some really rough water through Tuesday.

Water was choppy down at Lanark.  We made a run to the west and came up with nothing.  We looked for reds, found lots of bait, but no fishes.

Headed out to Lanark reef and made a few drifts with the wind sock out.

One lady fish and one sea bass and the wind was making it uncomfortable out there.  We headed in with a pre Lee meeting behind us.

The weather has broken and the water temps are down.  Lots of butterflies and hummingbirds around.

Looks like I will be tarpon less again this year.

Fiddlin' For Scallops at St. Marks

8.24.11

Wanting some scallops to go with our sea bass we caught yesterday we headed down to St. Marks to try our hand at a little inshore fishing and then scallop treasure hunting.

We were greeted with strong easterly winds.   We managed to put in a few drifts at the St. Marks reef, but all we caught that was gamey was one little trout and one little sea bass.   But the sharks left sore mouthed.  Again, Nancy is number one when shark are in the area.

We decided to head in as the tide was falling to try and get some scallops.

It started off slow.

 I was getting in to some quality float time.

Finally Patty picked up her fiddle and things got good real quick.  We found them on the spongey grass in about 4 feet of water.

I guess the fiddle playing brought them up nicely.

The Final Result!

Whale of a Time on Wakulla Reef

8.23.11

Temp. Air=low 90's, Water=89-90

Tide: Almost high to outgoing

I got a tip from our neighbor that the Friday before some daulphin had been caught out at the Wakulla Reef.  The bait had moved in and the water has been so hot that they had migrated in pretty close to shore.

So, Willie and Patty came in town to visit and I asked if they wanted to give it a try.  I think Willie's reply was in the range of "Hell Yea!".

So we headed out on calm seas and a beautiful morning for the end of August.

I have three gps coordinates for Wakulla Reef and our strategy was to hit each one and then fish a patch of live bottom I had found a couple years ago on the way back in.  We would call it a day after that and look forward to a cold cereveza.

At our first drop we found the sea bass and grunts to be relatively cooperative.  Soon I was pulling a small grunt in and a 20 lb. kingfish came tearing out from under the boat and grabbed it.  Willie quickly dropped his bait down and the king grabbed it and promptly bit him off.

Patty soon started grunting and brought up this nice endangered gag grouper.

The action slowed and we moved about a mile east and started the process again with the same results.  This time Willie caught the nice gag.

Notice the serious fisher people in the back of the boat trying to duplicate Willie's technique.

The action slowed here also and we picked up to fish our last marked spot on the reef.  As we proceeded we suddenly saw the birds in action and slid over to the commotion.  Patty had her video camera on this time and recorded the action.  We were excited since we came for the daulphin and this looks like them.

THIS VIDEO HAS A LOT OF BAD CURSE WORDS IN IT, SO DO NO LISTEN IF YOU ARE OFFENDED BY SUCH CRUDE MANNERS.  THE CAPTAIN IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THE LANGUAGE OF HIS CLIENTS!!!!!!

All we could manage was sharks out of this pod of crazy fish.  Daulphin, big cobia and sharks were all present.  We really messed up this opportunity but we did get some sharks.

Here are some videos to prove it.

The last one about tore Nancy's arms off.

We then headed to the hill.  I wanted to stop at a patch of coral I found when fishing with Doug and Linda a few years ago.  We caught some nice sea bass and a big shark then.  I wanted to add to the black sea bass in the cooler.

We started catching the sea bass and then Nancy really heated up catching two nice red grouper that hitched a ride home with us for dinner.

On the way back in Patty saw a whale jump out of the water near the 26 bouy.  When we got home we realized it jumped at the time of a 5.9 earthquake hitting the east coast.

Coincidence or earthquake result?

It was indeed a whale of a time today with the Bentley crew!

Still Kind of Slow

8.19.11

Tide Outgoing

Water temp: 88-89

Nancy and I went out to try to find some fish for incoming fishing/scalloping family.

Unfortunately, unless they want to catch monster ladyfish and catfish we don't have a lot to show them.

We headed out of Panacea Harbor this morn.

 It was a nice morning with a slight breeze cutting through the humidity.

Headed out to Ochlockonee Shoals and fished in 15 to 20 feet of water.  Nancy did score a keeper trout on a shrimp which magically turned into a fish taco last night.
I had a small cobia break off and caught some whopper ladyfish.
Other than that it was a nice boat ride.

Crystal River Mini Slam

8.13.11

Tide: outgoing

Doug and I went out in the back of King's Bay this morning.

I came down to wish him happy birthday and we were looking for a reason to smoke the cigars I gave him for his bday, so we decided to go fishing and use them as insect repellant.

He said the jacks had been back there, and he was right as he immediately sacrificed a chrome chug bug to a big jack that thought it was a fleeing mullet.

We eased around his favorite corner and I had a bass hit my toxic mullet badonkadonk and promptly pulled loose.

As we headed towards some culvert pipes I threw a nice cast down the edge of the seawall and had this good jack try to take my (Doug's) rod away.  It didn't work.  We got him in the boat for the first half of the saltwater mini slam.

We continued easing our way around the multiple cuts and coves in the back of the bay.  As the sun got higher and the tide got lower the topwater bite was diminishing  

Doug managed to land this nice bass for the other end of the freshwater mini slam.  

I can't remember what he was using, but it must have been something he can soak for a while, cause  he get pretty quick on the trigger on anything he can see bite.

We called it a day as the flotilla of boats headed out for a day of fun.