Sport Shrimping On The Indian River

Sport shrimping on the Indian River tonight was slow to say the least.

Coming home from my fishing excursion this afternoon, I noticed a ton of people congregating on the causeway bridge and new fishing pier preparing for an evening of sport shrimping. So, I decided to check out what was happening.

When I got to the fishing pier this evening at about 8:30 p.m., there was quite a crowd despite the fact that the shrimp weren't running.

The guys I talked to on the bridge were catching shrimp, but they weren't the historic numbers that the locals here are used to catching.

No one had even close to the 5 gallon bucket limit and most of the shrimpers I saw had only a few shrimp in their buckets.

I decided to walk over to the newly constructed fishing pier and see if anyone over there was doing any better.

I struck up a conversation with a gentleman from Tenn. who is wintering down here. He told me the water temperature was still too cold for the shrimp to be running in good numbers.

The water temp was in the 60s, and according to him, the water temperature should be a bit warmer before the shrimp head to the surface. I was always under the impression that the shrimp didn't run well until the water cooled down.

We talked about the many reasons why shrimp run or don't run and agreed that they run when they feel like it. It's hard to predict mother nature.

Anyway, he told me about some fishermen that recently caught some nice slot size sea trout just prior to the last cold front. One of them was a "gator" trout that was caught around the pilings of the new restaurant.

He also told me about the bull redfish that he saw a couple of weeks ago over the lights. He said he tried everything but they wouldn't bite.

I didn't mention to him that I already knew about the bull redfish. They come in to feed on the small trout and baitfish that are attracted to the lights and the shrimp. They can be caught but they're usually well over the slot limit.

Anyway, I halfheartedly cast a jig a few times without any luck and after taking a few pics of the inaction, decided to head for home.

Here are the picture results of the night's shrimping.

I hope the fishing is better tomorrow.


Tight Lines

Mosquito Lagoon & Indian River Fishing Report For Saturday 1-29-2011

The Mosquito Lagoon & Indian River Fishing Report for Saturday 1-29-2011 is intended for fishermen who prefer to wade or fish from the bank.

Today the Mosquito Lagoon around Bio Lab road was perfect for wade fishermen using light tackle with jerk baits or gold spoons. The water is still crystal clear in most all of the areas and fish can be spotted from the road if you watch the water carefully.

I saw several people wade fishing this afternoon, as well as a couple of kayakers who were fishing the potholes for sea trout and reds that often hang around their edges. I don't know what the guys in the kayaks were catching, but the wade fishermen were doing pretty good with the sea trout.

I prefer fishing the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge roads, so after checking out the fishermen around Bio Lab road, I moved on to the entrance of Peacocks Pocket.

Today there was a lot of traffic on the unimproved road, mostly out of state visitors who were enjoying the weather and the beautiful wildlife.

The rosette spoonbills flocks were in several areas, as were the other more common egrets, herons and smaller shore birds. All were ready to please our out of state bird watchers.

There was a slight breeze on the water that eventually turned into a dead calm around 5:00 p.m. or so.

Without going into too much detail, I spent about two hours fishing both sides of the road and only managed to land a couple of small trout and two "rat" redfish; both of which were just under the slot limit.

I also missed four other nice redfish and three other fish that I believe were sea trout. Most of my fishing was done on the marsh side of the road.

The lures of choice today were a gold "hammered" Bagley spoon and a green DOA jig head with a green 6" Terminator Snapback cyberflexxx jerkbait body.

All of the redfish that I caught or missed was with the gold spoon, and the trout were all caught or missed with the green jerkbait.

After a slow start, I realized that I had been fishing too fast for the water temperature. I slowed down the presentation to a crawl and began catching fish on both baits.

Most of my fishing today was done with the gold spoon, mainly because I was targeting redfish.

I switched to the jerkbait because of the frustration of casting to swirls and not getting any hits with my spoon, but once I slowed down the spoon's retrieve; the redfish magically began to bite.

I "jump fished" only about one quarter of the total length of the road; but what I fished, I fished thoroughly and hard.

I think the reason I enjoy fishing the opposite side of the river so much, is that it resembles the type of trout fishing I grew up with in Pennsylvania's gin clear trout streams.

Anyway, as the awesome sun set over Titusville, I took a few pics of the sunset and headed for home.

It definitely gets chilly without a wrap this time of year when the sun goes down and true to form, I forgot my coat.

Tomorrow is supposed to be warmer so we'll see if the fishing has improved any.

Till then, Tight Lines to all!

Take A Kid Fishing..................

Late Friday Fishing On The Indian River

Since I wasn't able to get out to the river last weekend to do any fishing, I decided to hit the water early this weekend.

I didn't have to work hard to talk my wife and Elmo into a quick run around Peacocks Pocket road to see if anything was hitting.

The weather was beautiful but chilly.

The temperature was in the 50s but the wind was blowing hard enough to make it feel like the low 40s.

We entered the road at Catfish creek and after taking a few pictures of the wildlife, I put my Nikon CoolPix back into it's case.

It turned out to be a bad move.



On the next turn, Karen and I surprised a beautiful sea otter that was sitting just off the road. As I slowed to a stop, the otter quickly turned around and dove back into the water with barely a ripple before I could unpack my camera and take a picture.

Since it was about 4:30 we drove to a few of our regular spots to "jump fish" for trout and redfish.

We spent about 15 minutes at the first stop without any fish. I got a tap from a sea trout on my jerkbait, but it wasn't hooked well and got off.

Today I was fishing a green headed DOA jighead with a Terminator Snapback cyberflexxx jerkbait body in a mullet pattern.

Karen was fishing for redfish with shrimp and never got a bite.

We made several more stops on our route without getting any hits before deciding to call it quits.

As we were leaving the preserve, Karen wanted to try one more stop at the "duck blind".

This is an area where we normally catch both redfish and sea trout on a regular basis so we made this our last stop of the day.

About the time I resigned myself to being "skunked"; I pitched my jerkbait right on the bank and worked it off into a drop off.

The sea trout must have been watching the lure flip into the water because it inhaled the bait.

I unceremoniously landed the fish and had Karen take this picture. The trout was released unharmed to hopefully grow into a "gator".

We were both cold and hungry, so we packed up our rods and drove slowly out of the preserve.

As we got close to the canoe launch at Peacocks Pocket, we saw an old friend that I had almost forgot inhabited this area; a large bobcat.

It lumbered across the road and briefly cast a glance at the truck before disappearing into the brush.

Even though we didn't slay the fish this evening, we enjoyed the scenery and the presence of animal life that many people never get a chance to see in the wild.

Hopefully the fish will be biting tomorrow.

Tight Lines to your all.

Mosquito Lagoon And Indian River Fishing

The Mosquito Lagoon and Indian River fishing has been great so far this month for sea trout, redfish and medium to large schools of black drum.

I took off late this afternoon to score some trout in the Indian River and wasn't disappointed.

The late start was intentional since I have found that the trout bite better later in the afternoon and just before dusk.

Today's trip was a clone of yesterday afternoon's fishing trip. The water had a slight ripple and the wind had a chill to it that was not quite as bad as yesterday.

The trout in the marsh canal were biting but they were sluggish and would not take a lure unless it was fished very slow.

In about an hour and a half, I managed to catch only three trout that were keepers.

I had several taps and half hearted hits that I believe were from smaller trout and I missed one slot sized redfish.

The trout were hitting my green DOA jig head tipped with a Strike King 3X cyber flex jerk bait. The salt impregnated jerk bait has a garlic flavor and can stretch up to at least a foot, if you care to do it.

The bait is perfect for winter time fishing when you have to fish lures very slowly. The fish just refuse to let go of the bait.

Anyway, I was going to keep the trout but since it was late, I didn't feel like cleaning them so I just took a couple of pics and let them go.

All the fish were caught within a 50 yard stretch of water in the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge marsh area.

After I missed the redfish, I decided to head for home and came across a couple of guys in a canoe that weren't having much luck and were also packing up to leave.

They told me they came across a school of black drum on the Indian river side, but they didn't catch any of them.

They then hauled the canoe over the to the other side of the road and fished the marsh canal without any luck.

The canal is about three feet deep at its deepest point near the road and gets progressively shallower everywhere else.

The best places to fish near dusk is right at the road, which is why I go out late in the afternoon during the winter. During the day, you will have better luck casting right on the opposite bank and slowly swimming the bait back to you.



On the way out of the preserve I took these pics of the beautiful sunset. No matter how many times I fish this area, I still become awed by the wildlife and the beautiful sunsets.

Till next time.

Tight Lines.

Mid January Trout Fishing On The Indian River

Mid January trout fishing on the Indian River is as good as it gets. The water is clear and sight fishing for reds and sea trout is at its best.

This afternoon I packed up my wife and Elmo our wonder dog for an excursion around the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge.

The weather has been cold this past week and the water temperatures are right down there.

Today was sunny and the air temperature was in the 60s up until about 4:00 when it dropped about 7 degrees.

There was a mild wind to contend with most of the afternoon which caused casting problems for my wife and myself.

Karen was fishing a Billy Bay "Lowcountry Lightning" Pop-N-Gurgle float with a 15# fluorocarbon leader about 18" long and a dead jumbo shrimp for bait. She was on the prowl for big redfish.

I was using a green DOA jig head with a Strike King 3x Zulu jerkbait on the business end and gold Bagley hammered spoons on my other two rods. The last rod was rigged with a
D.O.A.® C.A.L. Jerk Baits - 4'' - Electric Chicken color.

I was hoping for some decent sized trout for dinner or a slot redfish. Today I planned on eating my catch!

We both fished several locations on the marsh and river sides of the unimproved roadway and for the first half hour or so, neither of us got a strike.

Our usual "jump fishing" tactic wasn't working too well today because of the windy conditions. It was difficult to see any fish movement and when I did see some swirls, they turned out to be cute little puddle ducks.

All of my usual spots today proved to be void of fish, even though ripples on the water normally makes for some good fishing.

Finally, after about 50 casts or so, I landed a "rat" redfish that followed my jig combo right up to the bank.



I took a picture of the fish just to prove I caught something and returned it to the water.

Karen was still trying her best to get a bite, but the fish apparently wanted nothing to do with fresh dead shrimp today. Sometimes that's just the way it is.

As the afternoon wore on, the wind started calming down a bit so we decided to move on towards "bobcat bay". The name was chosen for obvious reasons!

Anyway, I spied a fish pushing bait up towards the bank so I pulled over and started casting ahead of where it was feeding. The fish wanted nothing to do with my bait, so Karen tossed out her offering and started Popping and Gurgling to attract a fish.

After awhile, Karen saw a nice fish swirl and thought she had hooked bottom. When she finally pulled in her rig, she realized the bottom had been a fish and she pulled up baitless.

Karen pointed out a narrow stretch of water to me where she saw a fish splash, so I quietly tossed my jerkbait around the area.

After a few casts, I finally picked up a nice keeper sea trout that inhaled my lure. Karen took a pic as I tried to get the hook out, but it lodged in the gills and the fish started bleeding.



I knew the fish wouldn't make it, so I put this one in the cooler for dinner.

As the waters became calmer, the fish were easier to spot moving around. We stopped at two more areas where we saw some fish but nothing was interested in what we were offering.

After I managed to cast right on top of a nice redfish and spooked it to hell; Karen and I decided to call it a day and head for home. She was still suffering from a bad cold, and I wasn't feeling much better.

As we crossed the bridge at the new fishing pier on the way home, we saw several groups of shrimpers setting up their generators and shrimp lights for the night's shrimping activities on the bridge and lower fishing pier.



The shrimping has been getting much better in this area since the temperatures remain on the cold side. The Haulover Canal shrimpers have also been pulling in more and larger shrimp lately.



I may hit the bridge tomorrow night and get a shrimping report. Until then.

Tight lines to all!

The Indian River Shrimp Are Finally Running

The Indian River shrimp are finally running!

I got bored watching the boob tube and decided to zip down to the Indian River to see if the shrimpers were having any better luck than they had been having for the past month or so.

It was about 8:00 when I parked my truck underneath the newly constructed bridge. I grabbed my fishing rod and my trusty Nikon camera and started taking pictures of the shrimpers doing their thing on the upper bridge and newly constructed lower fishing pier.

The night was beautiful. No clouds, a starry sky and a partial moon. The only noise was the hum of the generators that were providing juice for the underwater lights.

There were at least 20 shrimpers working the water columns on the bridge and on the new lower pier. Everyone was intent on catching large to jumbo shrimp above their generator powered shrimp lights.

I took the pics you see here along with a few movie clips of the action. There were hundreds of bait fish in the water column.

Pinfish, small flounder, needlefish, croaker, sea trout, and even a few goggle eyes were schooling around the lights along with the occasional shrimp.

I tried throwing a small jig around for a while, but I didn't want to invade the shrimpers territory too much. After catching a couple of medium sized croaker, I put up the rod and started questioning some of the guys about the shrimping.

Some guys were just setting up their home made shrimp light using a battery for power on the lower pier. The rig was a automobile headlight inside a foam life preserver. It looked like hell but it put out enough light to do the job.

Within a few minutes one of the guys netted a large shrimp using the makeshift rig and several more while I was still there.

The general consensus was that since Christmas, the shrimp were running much better.

Bob Smiley told me about a guy who braved the weather around Christmas day and loaded up his 5 gal. bucket with large to jumbo shrimp while everybody else was sitting in the comfort of their homes.

Bob also clued me in on some hot spots for black drum and jumbo redfish up around the geodetic dome north of Haulover Canal. I won't get into specifics but he said one of the spots was a lot like a fish hatchery. Karen and I have to give it a try next time we get out.

Here's Bob trying to snag some Indian River shrimp.



The shrimping around Oak Hill down south past Melbourne has been jumping from what everybody told me tonight.

I know for a fact that around Oak Hill in the Mosquito Lagoon ICW, you can load up a bucket of shrimp pretty quick when the tide is running. The only problem is that they are generally smaller than those found in the Indian River Lagoon.

There are a few "honey holes" in the Haulover Canal that produce nice size shrimp almost all year long. Right now, the canal is reportedly pretty "hot".

After taking a few more pics and short videos, I was getting chilled so I decided to call it a night before I got a case of pneumonia.

Hope you enjoy the pics.

Till next time,
Tight Lines!

Indian River Trout Are Still Eager To Please

The Indian River trout are still eager to please any angler who cares to wet a line and go after them.

I hadn't planned on doing any fishing today, but late this afternoon after finishing most of my chores, I managed to sneak in a few casts from the docks in the small park across from the Wachovia bank.

The weather was beautiful with only a slight wind to ripple the Indian River.

I walked down to the docks with the spinning rod that I usually carry in my truck loaded with 30# yellow power pro, an 8' fluorocarbon leader and a green DOA jig head with a green 3X Strike King jerk bait on the business end.

My first cast parallel to the dock landed me a legal 17" sea trout. The fish put up enough of a battle for the people around me to ask what I caught it on, and how many fish I caught.

I released the fish and continued casting underneath the dock pilings and after a few more casts landed another clone to the first sea trout. I released this one and continued casting until I lost the jig combo underneath one of the dock pilings.

I switched to a small gold Johnson spoon and after about a dozen or so well placed casts, picked up another sea trout slightly larger than the other two I caught on the jig combo.

After releasing the fish, I continued casting the spoon and missed three more fish before deciding to call it a day.

My wife called and wanted me to pick up a pizza for dinner. It sounded good to me so I packed it in and headed for Lil Ceaser's.

Indian River trout are still biting readily on a variety of baits if you can manage to fish them slowly. Today there were at least five other fishermen on the docks casting jigs, spoons, shrimp or swim baits in the exact same spots I was fishing and I was the only one catching any fish.

The only difference was the technique. Instead of cranking like hell to get the bait back, I just inched the lure through the vegetation on the bottom of the river.

It pays to fish slow during the winter time even on bright sunny days.

Till next time, Tight Lines.

Another Great Trout Fishing Trip On The Indian River

Unlike yesterday, when I couldn't buy a bite, today's fishing trip on the Indian River was exceptional.

My wife and I decided late in the afternoon to take Elmo out to the "swamp" and see what was biting, if anything.

Unlike most of the past two weeks, the weather was beautiful with the temperatures in the high 70s.

Since it was almost 4:00 when we got into the truck, I decided to just hit the first entrance to Peacocks Pocket road and fish just around the corner from Catfish Creek.

There was little to no wind on the river side and dead calm on the marsh side of the road, so I started casting with one of my favorite jerk baits.

On the second cast, I felt a sharp tug, set the hook and eventually landed a small redfish.

The fish hit just as my bait was coming off the opposite bank into deeper water. This is relative because the deepest part of the marsh canal in this area is only about two feet.

Karen got out of the truck to take these pictures, but first cast her "Billy Bay" low country lightning pop n gurgle and shrimp combination out to the opposite bank.

She pulled it back about two feet into slightly deeper water and after no more than 10 minutes had a redfish on that was almost a clone to the fish I caught.

Meanwhile I decided to walk the bank blind casting to likely spots to get out of Karen's way.

After about a dozen casts, I picked up two more small trout about 14" and 16" on the same bait.

The lure I was using today was a green DOA CAL jig head with a green Strike King 3X jerk bait on the business end. The lure works great in tannin colored water and the action produced by the extra flexible jerk bait drives sea trout nuts.

Several casts later I picked up a heavier sea trout that measured a hare over 21" using the same bait and my ultra slow retrieve.

This one sloshed around a bit before I got it up the bank, but there was no chance of losing the fish. It inhaled the jig combo.

Karen took some pics and I put the fish back to fight another day.

The bite slowed down and Karen wanted to move up the road a bit to hit another spot. We moved about 100 yards and tried our luck again. This time she fished the river side and I stayed with the marsh canal.

It didn't take long before I picked up another nice sea trout, this one was about 24" and put up a respectable battle before I released it back to the river. Again the fish was suckered into hitting the DOA jerkbait combo.

Karen was not getting any hits so we moved one last time to a culvert about ten yards or so up from where we were fishing.

Since it was getting dark, I switched to a gold Bagley diamond spoon with the hope of hooking up to one of the oversize redfish that prowl the canal around dusk.

On the second cast, I hooked onto what I first thought was a redfish however, I quickly realized it was another big trout. This one put up a good fight but was no match for the heavier gear I was using.

I landed the trout and took a couple of pics as best I could and again released the fish.

Karen wasn't having any luck on the river side and except for the blood thirsty mosquitoes, I stopped getting bites.

It was a little past 5:30 when we decided to call it quits and head back home.

It was only then that we realized how many fish we caught in such a short period of time. I had one redfish and five sea trout and Karen had one redfish. Not bad for a little over an hour's worth of fishing.

On the way back I stopped to get gas and talked to a guy who had limited out on sea trout. He was icing them down for the trip back to Orlando. All his fish were 15" to 19" and were caught on live shrimp.

It was another great trout fishing trip on the Indian River for everyone today!

Till next time,

Tight Lines.