A Few Nice Surprises

 

Today was one of those windy, dreary days when you just hope you catch a fish with the tough conditions considered. I had met Brian Roach and his son Michael and friend Lee down at the Sawpit Creek boat ramp and as we were running to our first spot the wind was already kicking a bit. But we made our way around to Pumpkin Hill and set up to drift float rigs and live shrimp along the bank. All three anglers had good drifts but we had no real takers. We eased up to a point of grass ad fished the other side and drifted back and it wasn't long before Lee "knocked the skunk off" when he hooked up ad landed a nice keeper sized Seatrout

After moving down a to a grassy island that just had the tips of grass showing on a very hide tide, we had few nibbles, but no takers....until Michael had made an excellent cast over to some far marsh grass. When his float disappeared he quickly caught up the slack and let the circle hook set and, Big Fish On!  I have to admit I didn't intentionally mean to slur the fish but at first I thought it was a small Shark. Michael kept the pressure on as the big fish took him from the bow up to the stern and around as it ripped drag heading East. He slowly worked it in and when I saw a tail thrash the surface my "guess" of a shark  began to look pretty  bad. The big fish came to the surface a couple of times and all we could see was a tail and then I became more confident it was a big Redfish! Michael confirmed that when he brought to the net an Oversized 28.5" Redfish, boy what a fish!

We worked along the bank, back to the original point where we had begun the day at and as Brian released his bail to get a longer drift, he had a hookup and brought to the net another keeper sized Seatrout. A short run over to Seymore's Pointe where we fished a large drainage as the tide started out produced nothing but a few nibbles. Then, thru Horsehead we went and around to Poteat Cut, but again, no real bites.

After running thru Horsehead we fished a point at Poteat Cut, than came back to Jackstaff and fished some drainages. Brian  had made a good toss to the mouth of one of those drainages and when his float disappear he lifted the rod and let the circle hook set. It was a strong fish but wasn't putting up much of a fight and we found out why when Brian brought to the net a big 20" Flounder! This fish moved Brian into a tie for First Place in the Anglers Mark 2023 Bragging Rights Tournament-Flounder Category(scroll down the right side  of this report for standings).

We finished the day fishing some docks with jigs and shrimp and rounded out a good box of "keepers" with Mangrove Snapper catches. And with that, we called it a day, another great one to be fishing here at Amelia Island, Florida. 

Doormatt Bumps For Bragging Rights

 

We had an outstandingly beautiful morning today when I met Mark Smith and his son Zach out at the Goffinsville Park. I'm always hoping for less wind and today we had it - and began to wish for some breeze before the trip was over!

We ran down the Nassau and pulled up at Twin Creeks to fish float rigs with live shrimp on a tide that had been going out for a few hours. Although there was a bunch of bait movement and shark movement we didn't get much other than a Shark breakoff and a hard fighting Jack Crevalle. After moving down the river we switched to jigs and shrimp and minnows and worked some oyster banks. Both anglers were getting excellent casts and were working their baits effectively, but we had no real bites.

Switching back to float rigs and Seymore's Pointe, the duo outsmarted a handful of Mangrove Snapper, a few of which were of keeper size -Zach had the biggest, measuring right at 12". We fished some dock pilings and again hooked up and

landed some Mangroves. We had a few of those in the box which have some nice fillets, but hardly enough to make a full meal and it looked like that was going to be the bag for the day.

We hit one more spot, fishing between two docks and here we flipped the tables on end!  Mark had went in to a specific spot, let it set with his mud minnow wiggling on an 1/8 jig and, he thought he had hung on  a rock or log and, Fish On! Mark played it patiently to the net and landed a 18'5" Flounder! But the best was yet to come! He went back to the same area and within minutes, "THUMP" - Fish On!  This fish, like the other dug deep, didn't fight a whole lot, but we could tell it was heavy. Again, Mark patiently brought it up to the surface and we saw it was huge Flounder and when netted it measured 22.25" - big enough to move Mark into First Place in the Anglers Mark 2022 Bragging Rights Tournament-Flounder Category, boy what a fish! (Scroll down the right side of this report for link to standings).

We fished out all our bait, adding another Mangrove or two, then we headed back, counting it as another great day to be fishing here at Amelia Island, Florida.