Dark and Stormy Day

When Walker Welch and I communicated on the phone last night the weather forecast was showing 30-40% chance of rain for this morning. When I got up the forecast was showing 100% and sure enough, when I stepped outside to hitch the boat trailer, it was drizzling. But I hunted down some live shrimp and met Walker and his buddy Drew up at the Dee Dee Bartels Park boat ramp and by the time we pulled away from the dock the rain had quit and there was only a slight breeze. It was overcast but a nice day to be
fishing!

We made a run up to Jolley River and fished the "bank" with about 3 hours left on an incoming tide. The two anglers were tossing float rigs and live shrimp to the flooding grass. We got a bunch of nibbles and Walker did "knock the skunk off" when he put a hungry Seatrout in the boat.   We then ventured further up the river, fished another grass bank, then moved inside Snook Creek and tried our hand at pitching jigs. All we got were baitstealers.

After coming back to the outside of Tiger we had just set up an a grassy point when Walkers float disappeared with a vengeance and, Fish On! Walker played it perfectly, let it run, worked it in, and landed a nice 22" Slot Redfish. And shortly after that Drew got in on the action and put a keeper sized Seatrout in the boat.  We had another Trout or two then the baitstealers moved in.

Our next stop was around in Bell River. Drew caught another Seatrout, then Walker had another BIG hookup. This was a big fish, ripping drag and having none of coming towards the boat. It stayed up in the shallows - I didn't want to jinx anything so I kept my mouth shut - but sure enough, BAP! Fish Off. It had dug down into some oysters and cut the line! 

We ran over to Lanceford Creek and fished a grass patch where we had some good action, catching a couple of Trout and a few feisty Redfish, then we tried Soap Creek to no avail, then wrapped up fishing some docks back at Eagans Creek where Drew put the final keeper in the boat, a nice 17" Sheepshead. And with that, we called it a day, another great one, albeit cloudy, to be fishing here at Amelia Island, Florida.