Slalom Ski Water

I fished again with Tom and Teresa Gaslin, up from Jax celebrating their anniversary, and taking in an Amalia Island Back Country fishing trip. I met them up at the north end  and boy was the water calm - and it stayed that way! At one point Tom commented that the water was so slick it was "slalom ski water"! 

Our first stop was over on the outside of Tiger and wouldn't you know it, first cast, the "demo" cast, we had a hookup.  Teresa worked it expertly to the boat and landed a fat Seartrout.  It was so close to "keeper size" we'd of had to
debate with the Game Warden, so we tossed it back.  We continued to work the flooded marsh grass as the tide started out, tossing float rigs with live shrimp, but we only had a nibble or two, so we cranked and ran up the outside of Tiger. We made one short stop at a marsh runout and tossed jigs but had no bites, so we continued on around to the Jolley "bank" and went back to float rigs. Not much happening there.

After running further up the Jolley and going back to float rigs to work the now exposed oysters Teresa finally had a good bite. As her float sank out of sight she reeled up her slack, set the hook, and Fish On! It was big enough to be pulling some drag and when it boiled up near the bank we knew it was a Slot Redfish. Teresa patiently played the fish to the boat and landed a nice 20" Slot Red.  And shortly after that her and Tom both had there floats disappear and their drags were ripping...and ripping...and gone! I think it may have been our first Bonnetheads of the year.

We bounced around the corner to the MOA and both Tom and Teresa landed a couple of Trout then wrapped up the day drifting along oyster beds, tossing jigs. Teresa added one more Trout to the catch. It was an absolutely beautiful day and a great one to be out on Amelia Island waters celebrating an anniversary.