Battle With A Beast For Bragging Rights

Celebrating his daughter's 16th birthday, Duane Schumaker treated his girls to an Amelia Island Back Country fishing trip on the Angler's Mark. Duane had birthday girl Jasmine along with her sisters Samantha and Savannah "the Legend",  when they met me out at the Goffinsville Park and boat ramp early this morning. We made a quick run around to Christopher Creek and began tossing float rigs with mud minnows (no shrimp available today). It didn't take long before the girls were getting bites with their floats disappearing and within a few tries they got the hang of hooking
up!  Jasmine put the first fish in the boat, a nice keeper sized Seatrout. Samantha followed that up with one of her own then we added a couple of smaller ones. We were fishing the minnows shallow over some flooded oysters and when one float went under and the drag began to sing, we knew we had a big fish - FISH ON! Jasmine was on the bow fighting the fish with her sister Samantha and as their line plowed thru some marsh grass, Duane had a hookup - another big fish on! He and Savannah were battling their fish while the crew on the bow battled theirs - we had
a double!  It took a while but we got the first fish in and netted, which turned out to be 26" and in the Slot and then we got the second fish in, an oversized 28" fish. Now that will wake everyone up! We fished the area thoroughly, had a bite or two, then ran around and thru the marsh to Jackstaff. I eased  up the bank with the anglers tossing their floats but we had no bites. We crossed over to fish a sandbar and began to get fish. Duane was tossing a jig and some dead shrimp that we'd dug out and he picked up a couple or three hungry Seatrout out deep. Then Jasmine caught a hard
fighting Jack Crevalle on the dead shrimp and later, when her drag began to rip on another fish I proclaimed "SHARK". This fish was big and was ripping drag and had no plans of coming to the boat. But Jasmine kept the pressure own and played it patiently. When the big fish got back in the current I released the anchor and followed it down the river. It took Jasmine from the bow to the stern and from starboard to port and back to starboard and back to port as we drifted down the creek. It was a battle of wills and Jasmine won - eventually landing a whopping 34" oversized Redfish and grabbing first place in the Anglers Mark 2017 Bragging Rights Tournament - Redfish Category. Boy what a fish! (Scroll down right side of this report for standings). We fished a good handful of spots, picked up another couple of small Reds, a nice Bluefish, a hard fighting Ladyfish, then called it a day, another great one to be fishing here at Amelia Island, Florida.