Rick Davidson (grassflats2@yahoo.com), Editor
"The RedManiac"
Wintertime has arrived, and with it some of the best fishing of the year. The grouper are being caught in close, the trout are schooling near the river and in deep holes, and the redfish remain active along the shorelines. You’ve got to pick your days, but when the weather allows, take full advantage of the inshore and offshore opportunities the winter has to offer..
Here at the Sea Hag , anglers report the following: trout are being caught in Biven’s Cove and near Dallus Creek, fishing deep during the chilly mornings and the shallower mud flats during the mid to late afternoon. Fish can also be found in the deeper rocky bottom south of the river, in depths of 4 to 6 feet. Lures of choice include slow-sinking Mirrolures in either hot pink or chicken bone colors. During the bitter cold days, try the mouth of the river and holes in the river with sinking Mirrolures such as the 20 MR. Gulp shrimp are working well also, especially in the pearl white and pink shine colors. Redfish are being caught near the shorelines and the bars and rock piles near the river, using gold spoons, a variety of Gulp baits, and jigs with Saltwater Assassin tails. Offshore, the grouper bite is excellent with trolled Stretch 30’s in multiple colors, including Clown, Tiger Dot and Red Tiger. And now from our topnotch guides...
Inshore Charter Captains
Captain Steve Rassel, www.lastcastrass.com
With the weather going from one extreme to the other every week now the fish seem to be doing the same. When the water temperature drops to around the 60 degree mark the fish are moving toward the rivers and creeks as well as the troughs that feed into them. They will be stacked up and if you find the right school you can catch a lot of fish very easily. After the water warms a day or two they are moving back to their staging areas on the flats, moving shallower as the sun warms the water in the middle of the day. They can be taken on grubs fished straight lined in the deeper water and under an Equalizer float in shallow water; Mirrolures are also working well; top water or the slow sinking varieties in the silver, gold, red or black colors are working best for me. The sea bass have also begun to show up in the deeper holes with plenty in the keeper size range.
Captain Tommy Thompson, www.flanaturecoast.com/capttommy
This is the season all serious trout fisherman wait for. This time of year the larger fish will be schooling and while it takes quite a bit of experience and knowledge to find them, 30 to 50 fish days are not impossible….and many of these fish will be over 20 inches which means you can only keep one. The key to catching them when you do find them is to fish suspending jigs and lures slowly. The fish will move around, and when the temperature is high they may move back out of the rivers and creeks. This makes afternoons the better time to fish on the flats, and mornings the best for rivers and creeks. In early December I took our reports editor, Rick Davidson, south of the river and in a rocky area in very shallow water we found a large number of mullet with trout and redfish surrounding the school. We caught some excellent fish over an hour or so, including this fine trout which weighed just a tad over 6 pounds. We caught several very nice slot sized redfish and lost one trout that was even larger. The key to this kind of fishing is to keep moving around, trying areas with structure as the water warms and fish slowly. Mid-December trips with Russ Roy, Paul O’Mara, Ed Ellett and Charlie Courtney produced literally hundreds of big trout as well as a score of nice slot-sized reds!
Captain Rick Bouley, www.naturecoastflatsfishing.com/
I took my wife out early one morning to do some scouting around for a charter on the next day. We passed all of the boats anchored up in the river and proceeded to an area quite a ways to the south. We arrived at the spot midway through the falling tide. Water temp was 55 degrees and the water was clear as crystal. This particular spot had proven extremely productive over the past two cold fronts and I was optimistic. The water was higher at the mid stage of the tide than I expected and there were no fish to be found. I began to move up the trench into shallower water and when I reached a depth of about 14" to 18" BINGO.....the sand holes were loaded with large trout and a few nice reds mixed in for good measure. We started tossing a Corky Mullet and started hauling in 3 to 5 pound trout...on almost every cast. It was hard to find one under 20". Also used a gold and black DOA Terror-eyz worked slowly across the bottom and it proved to be equally effective. Just for giggles I decided to give a top-water a try. I broke out a "Hot Chartreuse" Skitterwalk...and proceeded to watch the trout follow it to the boat but they just wouldn’t take it on several casts. Switching back to Corkys we caught a fish on every cast. Just proof that trout turn off to top-water lures in the colder water. We stayed through the bottom of the tide and about the first hour of the incoming and with the exception of a 20 minute slack water period, had steady action. I had a similar trip earlier in the month with our reports editor, Rick Davidson. We also found large numbers of trout in sand cuts through the flats, but they were slightly smaller fish. Meanwhile there are lots of trout in the river on cold days and it is my fervent hope that you will all choose to fish the river for the smaller trout and leave these larger ones to us nut-cases who like to turn them loose. After all, they are too big to keep more than one anyway...
Captain Randall Hewitt, www.naturecoastfishing.com
I would like to report that the trout are in the river. Ms. Nealy, who cleans fish at Sea Hag Marina, watched a customer catch over 45 speckled trout off the dock at Sea Hag. I fished the river and caught some myself. However I caught several limits of somewhat larger trout and reds in 1 to 3 foot of water from the river to Bivens Cove and also some nice fish south to Hardy Point. Berkley Gulp, in both white and natural gray were the colors that seemed to work the best.
Tight lines !!
Offshore Charter Captains
Captain Brian Smith, www.bigbendcharters.com
The big news is that trout are storming the river during the cold spells. Jigs and Mirrolures are the best baits. Work them slow along the bottom. Move around a bit for the best results and the tide can make all the difference in the world. Offshore, sea bass are bunched up on hard bottom areas from twenty to thirty five feet. Any chunk of bait will do. When the small fish start taking over the catch move around to the next piece of hard bottom and resume play. Big grunts are populating the rocky areas between forty and fifty feet. These are grunts you would be proud to bring in, as opposed to the ones you reluctantly clean because the grouper bite was slow. Grouper are biting best around the sixty foot depth. Trolling is working but bottom fishing is best. Live bait is the ticket but dead bait will work as well. It is unnecessary to run out past sixty five feet to bring in a quality catch of grouper. Be sure and check the forecast before going offshore. Cold fronts are pushing big seas with their passing.
Captain Wiley Horton, www.tunersportfishing.com
As expected, the grouper fishing has significantly improved as the water cools. Cigar minnows, sardines, herring and squid are all producing action. A fish finder rig with a sliding sinker is my tool of choice. Try trolling a Stretch 30 or similar plug on days when surface grass concentrations do not prevent it. I like using 30-50 pound test braided lines for trolling; the thin diameter allows the plugs to work deeper with less scope. For the next month, leave the drags a little looser than normal, there are still some large kingfish roaming offshore Steinhatchee. Red snapper are still plentiful in 50+ feet but must be returned to the water due to the closed season that extends through April. If you like red grouper, try anchoring on a live bottom spot and use a short length of chain rather than a sinker....the noise will attract a fat sea possum to your bait! If you can find live bait in the winter, it can significantly improve your success rate with all species, especially the sociable amberjack. NMFS's plan to close grouper fishing for one month beginning in February will seriously cut into our prime time for offshore, so book your trips in advance and I hope the weather holds for you.
Captain Walt Carlson, www.captainwalt.com
The cold weather earlier in the month brought fish in the river as well as the creeks. This whole period limits of fish were being brought in!! So what is the hot bait? There is none--the fish are being caught on everything---of course the old stand bys are still doing great-- the 3" Gulp! shrimp in new penny or white and live shrimp! I have been using live shrimp from my airboat in the creeks and catching lots of redfish! Lots of small ones but plenty of action! Check my pictures for a double on small reds -father and son getting plenty of action with the son catching the big red for the day. I did get to slip off to the short reef one afternoon and loaded up on black sea bass--using a double rig my buddy caught three eating size fish. So if you can find some time go FISHING ---everyone is catching!!
