Tripletail! BIG Tripletail at Amelia Island

We had a really nice morning today when I met Rick and Terry Payne up at Dee Dee Bartels Park boat ramp. The sun had just come up, we only had a slight breeze, and the tide was still low but coming in, so we headed north and west and over to Tiger Island to "pitch the logs" with jigs and live shrimp before they covered up. If we had been fishing for "baitstealers" then we were in the right spot.  Peck, Peck, Peck and the bait was gone. Peck, Peck, Peck and the bait was gone. What a pain!

So we came out and ran around to the Jolley
River and fished the "bank"  Rick was on the bow tossing a 1/8 jig while Terry took up the stern tossing a float rig. We didn't get a whole lot of bites, but did pick up a nice sized Croaker, some more bait stealers, then Rick put a feisty Redfish in the boat.

After running further up the river and setting up along a flooding grass line, both anglers took up the float rigs and we got into a flurry of fish catching. All told, they landed 6-7 Redfish, 5-6 Seatrout, a Ladyfish, and a few more baitstealers.   We came back around towards Amelia, ran thru Tiger and around to Bell River and set up along another grass line. After getting 1-2 small Trout we had a good hookup - Terry played it perfectly to the boat and landed our first keeper sized Seatrout. We then bumped around to the other side of a grass peninsular, caught a few more Trout, and just before we left, Rick made an excellent cast just beyond a small grassy island. BOOM! His float disappeared and his drag began to sing, BIG fish on!  This fish was having none of coming to the boat, or even to deeper water- it stayed up near the bank, boiled a few times - I thought for sure it was a big 'ole Redfish, then finally, Rick was able to work it out of the shallows and into the deeper water. He played it patiently and soon brought a massive 21.25"   7lb Tripletail to the boat!  I checked my records and it was the 2nd biggest Tripletail I've ever had on the Anglers Mark! Boy what a fish!

We checked a couple of flooded flats for tailing Reds, then headed in, counting it as another great day to be fishing here at Amelia Island, Florida.