Rick Davidson (grassflats2@yahoo.com), Editor
"The RedManiac"
June was a great month around the cleaning tables at the Sea Hag, but as the month ended the water temperatures climbed and we are approaching the summer pattern--the pattern that makes a mid-day siesta a great treat. Of course, that becomes difficult for the offshore guys, but everyone needs to make sure they hydrate themselves this time of year. Don’t drink fluids based on your thirst, because when you become rapidly dehydrated your thirst centers don’t always work, and keep plenty of ice and high SPF sunscreen and big hats on hand. July is always one of the most exciting months of the year, with the opening of scallop season on July 1. There will be a lot of out-of-towners not familiar with the water in our area, so help out when you can, and keep an eye out for maverick boats. Make reservations early, watch out for the sun, and remember you need a diver down flag and a fishing license to collect scallops, both of which you can get at the Sea Hag’s Ship’s Store. Preliminary scallop reports are excellent, so we’ll look for you sometime this month. If you’re not familiar with our area, many of our guides will do joint fishing and scallop trips. Here are their reports from this past month:
Captain Steve Rassell, www.lastcastrass.com
Hot, hot, hot--summer is here. Fishing shallow early continues to pay off with big trout and a surprising number of redfish. Action is slow in the middle hours of the day but gets good again in the afternoon. I fished a lot of charters in June and limits or near limits of trout were common. Redfish continue to be abundant and depending on the water level can be found along the shore and creek mouths, up to a mile offshore on spotty bottom. Schools of large tarpon are moving through the shallows now, more this year than I have ever witnessed on the flats around Steinhatchee. If you want to enjoy a day of great fishing with few other boats on the water, come during the week when the rest of the world is punching the time clock.
Captain Steve Hart, www.legallimitscharters.com
June has have been an all around good month. We have had good grouper catches using both cut and live bait in depths ranging anywhere from 40 to 80 feet. Kings have been doing great both trolling or free-lining a live bait. We have also had some good cobia catches both on the flats and offshore. Always be on the lookout…. you never know when one may show up.
Captain Wiley Horton, www.tunersportfishing.com
The heat of the summer is upon us and the fish are responding as they always do. There's plenty of baitfish to feed on and the gag groupers can get a little picky. The red snapper bite is red hot when the weather allows us to get to them. It doesn't take long to catch a limit of red snapper and red grouper; the record on the Tuner was set in early June....12 minutes. Florida snapper are dependable as Old Faithful for a great fish fry. AJs, kings and cobia are interesting diversions; Spanish macks seem to be everywhere tearing up the bait pods. We've seen hordes of voracious little mahi lately on floating debris.... legal size growing fast! I want to lay the first wahoo of the year on the docks at the Sea Hag, let me know if you're interested in catching it!
Captain Rick Bouley, www.naturecoastflatsfishing.com
It has been typical summer fishing conditions for the last two weeks with the early morning to mid-day tides being somewhat "Ho-Hum". The late afternoon and overnight tides are moving a lot more water and producing a much more aggressive bite for those brave souls willing to brave the thunder storms and lightning. Redfish were in the shallows in fair numbers until around the 22 nd. The mullet were also plentiful to the north and south but have thinned considerably in the last few days. For those who are interested, the "smallish" trout have been available out on the grass-flats in large numbers in the 4 to 6 foot of water range. All of the large trout that I have taken in the last two weeks, including a 27 1/2" beauty that weighed 5 1/4 lbs., were caught in less than 2 feet of water. I might add at this point that we kept several limits of trout for a fundraising fish fry by the Gainesville Offshore Fishing Club, and over half of the fish were full of roe. This would be a good time to consider taking fewer fish, especially if they seem fatter than normal for summer fish. Tarpon have been around in sporadic numbers and as usual it is hard to find them consistently in the same areas. My photos show my wife holding one of our donations, a 27-1/2" trout. The other photo is of Dale Thayer of Sarasota who is holding a 4 lb trout caught to the south in 12" of water.
Captain Walt Carlson, www.captainwalt.com
Fishing offshore this month has been hard work! Lots of grouper-but most are too small to keep. Except for the red grouper-they seem to be more plentiful then the gags. My pictures this month are a young man with his first barracuda--as you can see he is real proud of it.
The picture of the red snapper has a story to go with it---I was fishing one of my spots that has been good to me in the past for a few fish at a time. We had just started fishing when I went to the cabin to get my underwater camera and put it down to see what all was there because my fish finder lit up. Just as I got it to the bottom a BIG Goliath grouper swam by and I then heard one of the guys say he had something big. He fought it for about 10 minutes then let his buddy have it for another 10. They would get some line in and the fish would take it back out. Suddenly he started getting lots of line back, so I thought the fish had turned back towards the boat-but all we got back was this scaled 6 lb snapper----the grouper had taken it the same time he hooked the snapper. Lots of fun for about 30 minutes! Inshore, trout fishing has still been good and the bait remains the same as before, except the fish are going to deeper water when it gets hot. Scallops are being seen from Rocky Creek to Pepperfish and northwest up around Big Grassy Island, so it looks like we will have a good scallop season. And when you come to visit, don't forget the kids!!
Captain Tommy Thompson, www.flanaturecoast.com/capttommy
June has been an exciting and challenging inshore month. Large trout continue to be scarce during the heat of the day, but are available on topwater plugs at sunrise and sunset. Redfish have been keeping my charters busy, but they haven’t been easy. There are some excellent sized schools of redfish around rocky points and other structure, but they are on the move, and finding them one day is no guarantee for the next. If you have some known spots, it’s best to get into the shallows and fish the rising tide, hopefully a strong tide. Sometimes you may need to be patient if there are baitfish around, because sooner or later, the predators will show up. However, if there is no activity, don’t hesitate to move on to another area. Be on the lookout for actively moving schools of mullet or whitebait. The mid-depth and deeper grassflats, 3-8 feet deep, especially with spotty bottom and lots of pinfish, are holding large numbers of schooling trout. Fish with leadhead jigs, suspending plugs (MirrOlure Catch 2000’s) or plastic shrimp (D.O.A., glow or chartreuse)—live shrimp are quickly snapped up by the hordes of pinfish. We’re looking forward to the busy time of the year.
