Down To The Wire

 

We've got some wind kicking here at Amelia Island! When I spoke to Andew Perrin last evening I warned him that we'd be bucking the wind today if they wanted to give it a try. But he and his son Sam were willing to brave the wind so we met up at Old Town Bait and Tackle and after easing out of Eagans Creek we already had 15mph winds. We made our way over to Lanceford and to Soap Creek and fished a drainage with the winds at our back, tossing float rigs with live shrimp on a high tide that had reached it's peak. I don't think we had a nibble. 

We moved around the corner, fished a grassy island, then came back and fished between a couple of docks with the floats. We may have had a bobber go under a couple of times - it was hard to tell with the chop! After running thru that chop, back towards Fernandina, we turned down the intercoastal and made our way down the river to fish some structure with jigs down on the bottom. Here we did get some bites here and if we were keeping score, the fish won!  Sam did manage to put two nice keeper sized Mangrove Snapper in the boat.

After fishing back around Piney Island with only a few nibbles to show for it, we made our way back to Fernandina and found a somewhat sheltered spot out of the wind and went back to the float rigs with just short time to fish. Sam had made an excellent cast up near some rocks when his float disappeared - he tightened up and let the circle hook set and Fish On!  Sam played it expertly, battled it when it ran, and in a short while landed a nice 20" Slot Redfish. And only minutes later it was Andrew's turn to battle the big fish. His was ripping drag and digging down river then it would turn and head for the structure. Andrew would work it out, it'd go deep, then head back for the structure. Andrew stayed patient, worked it out and eventually landed an Oversized 27.5" Redfish, boy what a fish!  We photographed and tagged and released this fish, see Grey Fish Tag Research  and enter GFR62498 to follow.

To top things off, we were treated with a sighting of Manatees that came up in front of the boat!  With that, we headed back to the ramp and counted it as another great day to be fishing here at Amelia Island, Florida. 

Despite The Wind, We Did Good

After looking at the weather forecast last night, I was a little apprehensive about the chances of success fishing today. Temperatures were predicted to be in the mid 40's, which was OK with me, but wind predicted to be at 15mph which would make it challenging. But Bob Blalock and I were up for the challenge so we met up at Old Town Bait and Tackle boar tamp and made our way up the creek to fish some dock pilings on an outgoing tide that still had 2 hours to hit bottom.

It didn't take long fishing with jigs and live shrimp to begin to get bites. We had a good flurry of catches - small but feisty Redfish, and a Black "puppy" Drum. One of those Reds though, was in the Slot. All fish caught today were released. But then it was like a light switch was flipped and they turned off! So we moved down a couple of docks ,set up, and again caught fish, a handful of Reds and Drum. After about thirty minutes, with the tide almost at the bottom, we moved back to the original dock and BAM. BAM. BAM! Bob began to hook and land fish after fish. Redfish, Black Drum, and an occasional Seatrout. We kept an informal count of the Slots and we had at least 4 with one of them measuring right at 26.5", a "Tournament Red"!  We tagged this fish and released it. It can be followed at Gray Fishtag Research GFR62478.  One small Red that had 21 spots! Bob also had his limit(if he was keeping) of Black Drum.

We eventually made a run to some more structure, fished it with the jigs, and caught another handful of Reds and Trout. Our final stop was at the mouth of Eagans Creek, fishing the rocks, and although we had some nibblers we had no takers. S we eased  back to the dock and counted it as another great day to be fishing here at Amelia Island, Florida