It’s been more like summer than winter for the last several weeks and the fish are as confused as many of the local fishermen. We should be fishing the edges of deep holes in the morning while awaiting a daily migration to surrounding flats as the sun slowly heats the water during the day. Instead we have bait and predator alike camping overnight in shallow water and frolicking during the day like its summertime in the surf. We had three trips this week that prove the point.
Last weekend we took a precious couple to the pristine crystal clear waters between Ft. Pierce and Vero Beach. After finally finding the bait along the edges of mid-river spoil islands (they should have been in the muddy backwater holes and canals) we set up on one our favorite summertime fishing spots. We caught five trout and one snook within the first thirty minutes. All five of the trout were larger than the snook and exceeded 24 inches. Our fun abruptly ended when the captain of a cabin cruiser decided to anchor and sun bath directly over our fish.
Three observations need to made at this point of this report: 1.) do not ever anchor your boat where folks are fishing, it is incredibly rude and you are liable to have your ancestry disparaged, 2.) some people should not where Speedos, it can be an insult to nature and, 3.) don’t anchor a cabin cruiser in shallow water on a high tide, it may stretch your siesta a lot longer than you initially anticipated. (We did find several other pods of large snook and redfish holding along the east shoreline.)
Tuesday and Wednesday found us closer to home in the Sebastian Inlet backwaters. Tuesday started south of the inlet (Wabasso) and ended north (Grant). I think all fish left the former for the later. Redfish in large numbers and solid trout caught on Tuesday.
The following day we started and stayed in Grant finding snook, redfish and trout anxious to meet and greet us. Once again, these fish were along the eastern shorelines and holding to typical summertime patterns. (I lost count of the exact total of fish for the day sometime after we hit double digits – I do know we cleaned three reds and one trout while releasing the vast majority of the catch).
Friday and Saturday brought us back to our backyard in the Banana River and these were very much ‘red’ letter days. The half day trip on Friday yielded five reds (25, 34, 35, 36 and 45 inches), one 23 inch trout and one 24 inch snook. The reds were taken on finger mullet while the trout and snook were fooled by root beer colored jigs.
Saturday started slowly with only trout caught (two lost along with a snook) prior to 11:00 am and ended in fabulous fashion. Once we were positioned correctly on my redfish flat and the wind shifted from southwest to east/southeast, the redfish swarmed the shallow water to terrorize the schools of roaming mullet. We finished the afternoon with seven more redfish with the largest being close to 35 pounds (not inches). It was a great day … it was a great week … and it’s been a great summer this winter.
