As bad as the weather was last week 11/1 (winds 20-25), the weather, tides, and temps this week really cooperated.
My buddy and I actually fished 11/1 and he managed to get 2 snook and a couple smallish reds. I was spooling out on many cast. When the gusts hit 30 (estimate) it was pretty raw. He was wet and cold but me being the wuss had my waders on. I think it was 60ish - so the wind chill was pretty darn cold.
Regardless last weekend (11/07/2014) was pretty darn good.
With an overcast day in the works and winds in the 3-5 range it was perfect for some top water action. I'm not necessarily a big fan of it but with the water being skinny and very few weeds it seemed like a good lure to start with.
Here's a look at what I was throwing; I bought about 5 of them from Walmart when they were $2 a lure.
My cohorts were throwing their go to lures - spoons, but the plug started out the day hot and stayed hot until the tide switch.
I managed to land 12 snook - most in the upper teens area with a couple pushing mid 20's. These were all healthy fish with a good indication of hopefully another good summer next year.
Of particular note were two items. One nice gator trout was landed near a outgoing water behind a visible weed island. We'll call it 23".
With Jacks still hanging around I had sniped a couple few, but was really interested in the Reds that sometimes accompany them. Hooked into a decent Jack I saw that a Red was accompanying it; I hollered over to my colleague to come over and "Catch this Red". He was a mid 20's fish. With the Jack somewhat secure and still not ready to come in I left him swimming about.
All the sudden the Jack that I thought was done had a bunch new energy and boy was it heavy. I looked out and saw it was thrashing all over the surface. I was anticipating that a "smallish" shark had it when I saw the silhouette of a leaner fish. Sure enough the Red had smacked the Jack and had swapped places out. Laughing and hollering over at my buddies not to bother coming over because I had upgraded. Eventually the fish wore down and I landed him - a nice mid to upper twenties Red.
He was released to fight another day.
After the tide switch things calmed down and we called it a day around 10:45am. My final tally was 12 snook, 4 reds, 2.5 Jacks (.5 for the upgrade), and 1 gator trout.
My buddies had been targeting Reds and they hammered them - 12-15 each (maybe more). We'll call it +50 fish for all of us - all on lures. We probably would have topped 70 fish, but when the bite slowed I watched lots of fish ignore my lures. I suspect that live bait would have slain them.
Of particular interest was the fact that I had very few blow ups - these fish were on the feed back and committed hard and early to the plug. Many times it's 3-4 blow ups per hook up.
I hope you made it out last Sat because it was a great day. Today should be just as good.
20141108 - The upgrade...
20141108 - The upgrade...
Last edited by jbdba01 on Thu Nov 13, 2014 10:11 am, edited 2 times in total.
JB
Re: 20141108 - The upgrade...
Nice report JB! Good to hear there is some hot times in Fishon High!!
"Likes smokey old pool rooms N clear mountain mornins. Little warm puppies, children and girls of the night"?