Shiloh Road Fishing Trip

Sunday afternoon was rainy and dreary on the Space Coast, so around three o' clock this afternoon, I gathered my wife and Elmo our wonder dog, and headed for the Indian River to try our luck.

We traveled light. I took only one rod for a change, loaded with a Heddon topwater plug and a small box with some Creme paddle tail lures.

My wife grabbed her favorite Cajun Thunder rig and a small bag of shrimp, and we were off.

We decided on driving up to Shiloh Road to see if it was open for fishing and as luck would have it, it was. It was probably a bad omen when two vultures greeted us into the drive, but we had nothing else to do in the rain but go fishing.

The rain was steady but light enough for us to try several spots along the marsh and the shallows of the north Indian River.

The water was almost dead calm and we saw only a couple of redfish and zero trout.

My wife fished her shrimp and missed one nice sized trout in a spot where she caught an "almost gator trout" last year. That was the only good fish she had on all afternoon.

I "walked the dog" until my arm got tired and had absolutely no hits, so I switched to a white and brown Creme paddletail bait.

After almost wearing out my casting arm, I finally hooked on to either a super large gator trout, or a juvenile tarpon.

I was swimming the lure to the bank when I thought I'd hooked onto a snag. Then the "snag" started moving; FAST.

The fish ran up and down the narrow slough twice before it broke off. I could see that the fish was at least 36" long and that it looked silverish in the murky water, but I couldn't make out what species it was.

I know it was not a redfish because of the way it fought, so the only possible species left was either a big trout, or a small tarpon.

Whatever it was, losing the fish was my fault. When I replaced my topwater plug with the swimbait, I tied it on haphazardly and was in a hurry. Definitely a recipe for losing a fish.
On top of that, I had my drag tightened down way too heavy for 10# mono.

As I told my wife, that's why they call it fishing and not catching!

We got tired of being wet and on the way out of the unimproved drive took some pics of an American Eagle and some crazy spoonbills doing their thing.

Hope you enjoy the pics and till next time; Tight Lines!