Black Drum Are In The Haulover Canal!

The Haulover Canal fishermen have been scarfing up on black drum this week both in and out of a boat.

My friend Steve picked up eight drum over 25 inches long and a bull redfish 47 inches long, using a friend's boat at the Titusville, Fl. end of the canal, in just under two hours this past week.

He said he was using was old jumbo shrimp heads for bait on a # 5 hook and was fishing the deep drop at the mouth of the canal, with a heavy duty boat rod. I guess the odor of dead shrimp is what attracted the bruisers.

Cut mullet, shrimp, crabs, and clams fished on the bottom, also does the trick on attracting these line busters.

My wife and I drove through the Merrit Island National Wildlife Preserve today, to check out the water level around the peacock pocket area. The winds have driven the

water leve l up considerably. We spotted some fish chasing bait into th e newly submerged shallows, but nothing was touching my lures.

The wind surfers were having a ball in the Indian River near Parrish Park, but the windy conditions hampered any real fishing activity. Check out the pics.

Other than two other vehicles we saw in the preserve, we pretty much had the place to ourselves.

One couple that we saw fishing in bobcat cove, caught a nice drum and a couple of catfish, but other than that, no one seemed to be doing much.

We hit Haulover Canal late in the afternoon, and other than a few mangrove snapper didn't have much luck. The current was rushing towards the Mosquito Lagoon end of the canal at a pretty good clip, and even with surf rods and 4 oz. sinkers, we couldn't hold bottom long enough to get a decent bite.

Some anglers were picking up a few snapper here and there but for today, we didn't see any black drum or redfish caught.

There is a spot redfish tournament on the books for April 4th. in Titusville that will probably load up the boat ramp parking lots next weekend.

If the rains start as predicted tomorrow afternoon, and continues through the week, we're looking forward to a good tournament next weekend.

Till then, tight lines!