What A Wrap Up

 I fished today again with Andy and Jennifer Aberle, meeting them out at their home and riding along in their Pathfinder to try and find some fish! We stopped real close by and tossed float rigs with live shrimp to a large outflow on a high and outgoing tide but I was somewhat surprised to see hardly any current flowing -we had no luck.

We then ran thru Horsehead and over to Pompano Point and set up again with the floats and here we did have a bit of current and that paid off with a couple of  Seatrout catches. Continuing on up the intracoastal we made as stop and fished some structure with jigs and live shrimp. There were a bunch of baitstealers and only one Trout. After making the run up into behind Piney Island we set up current from some dock pilings and pitched to them, but to no avail. I was beginning to worry. 

Our next stop, further up the Intracoastal paid off, though. Jennifer was getting excellent casts up into some dock pilings and fishing it good - Andy was fishing off the outside. Jennifer had the first hookup, she played it perfectly and brought to the net a nice keeper sized Seatrout. Meanwhile, Andy had a strong bite out deep. It was ripping drag and in danger of getting tangled in the pilings. Andy worked the boat out, kept the pressure on the fish, then fought it to the net, a big 20" Black "puppy" Drum. 

After getting the fish measured, photographed and in the box, Andy went back to the same spot and BAM! Big Fish On!  I was thinking we were in a Black Drum "honey hole" but when this fish came to the surface we saw it was a large Slot Redfish. Andy played it patiently and landed it. He went back to the same spot and had another strong hookup -another Slot Red - they had their limit! 

We fished down a dock or two, then came back to the "hot spot" where Jennifer got in on the Big Fish action. She had made a great cast, fished it slow, and had the hookup. Jennifer fought the fish to the surface and the net - another Slot Red which we photographed and released. We had to hit 5 spots but the final one paid off so as we headed back to their dock we counted it as another great day to be fishing here at Amelia Island, Florida. 

Beautiful Day Outstanding Fishing

I got out this morning, meeting Dick Conley, David Gray,and Henry Ross up at the Old Town Bait and Tackle as  the sun was coming up, and with a tide that had been coming in for about an hour. We eased up the creek and found a crusty dock to toss jigs and live shrimp too and it wasn't long before we were getting fish. David "knocked the skunk" off by picking up a Slot Redfish out of "door number 3" and from then on we were catching fish. He and Henry had a few fish in the boat and I was beginning to wonder if Dick was intentionally "laying back" and giving them a head start - was he even putting bait on his hook?  But then eventually he moved in with his cast and began to put fish in the boat, too. 

We all noticed that most of the fish were caught as the river bottom dropped off, in about 6' of water. The water temperature had warmed a bit since last week, up to 57 degrees. We caught fish for two hours and they caught their limit of Slot fish (1 apiece) and then we continued to count - we had about 6 Slot Reds there, the biggest being 24" .  They also added two keeper sized Black  "puppy" Drum to the catch. 

When it finally slowed we ran down the Amelia River and fished some structure and here the trio picked up 2-3 small but feisty Redfish. Back up the river came, and around to Tyger Island, fishing the logs, and did find one more feisty Red. 

Our final stop was over on the outside of Tyger and with the tide up, we eased in to some shallow water and switched to float rigs and the shrimp. I was hoping for a Trout or two to wrap things up  but was pleasantly surprised, they began to get Reds!  Most of them were small but we counted another 4 Slot Reds caught, the biggest being 23".  The sun was up, we had been shedding jackets, and we had a nice mess of fish in the boat so as we headed back we counted it as another great day to be fishing here at Amelia Island, Florida.