Still Fishing The Ditches

Saturday, after mowing the lawn and working around the house during the heat of the day. I decided to see if anyone was still fishing the ditches in the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge.

My wife originally wanted to try her luck for redfish but it was still too hot for her so I packed a few rods and some water into the truck and took off for the Indian River.

The air temperature was 92 degrees when I crossed the bridge and there was a slight wind blowing across the river.

There were a few people jet skiing and wind sailing on the north end of the causeway and several anglers trying their luck on the south end.

It was around 6:30 pm when I decided to go fishing, so I headed directly to Peacocks Pocket to see if anyone was kayaking in the area.

When I got to the kayak launch, there was absolutely no one around.  In fact, I was the only person in the wildlife refuge all the time I was out there which is really strange for late afternoon.

Usually there are out of town visitors looking for alligators and rosette spoonbills but today I didn't see one car on the unimproved road.  I attributed it to the high grass along side the road.

Anyway, as I drove bast the kayak launch and the first set of culverts, I started casting a Johnson's Silver minnow primarily into the marsh canal.

I hooked a couple of ladyfish but they were small and flipped off after a couple of jumps.

I decided to switch over to a Chug Bug to see if I could stir up some action with bigger sea trout or a redfish so I tied on my tried and proven black back silver bodied Chug Bug.

In the first stretch just past the culverts, I caught two more small ladyfish and finally picked up a slot size sea trout.

The sea trout blasted the plug and headed for the bank and into the lush grass where it promptly got hung up.

I shimmied down the grassy bank and pulled the gill hooked fish along with a pound or so of sea grass up the bank.

I was going to return the fish but it's gills were bleeding so I put it in the cooler for dinner and started casting up the marsh canal.

The wind was picking up which made controlling the Chug Bug more difficult, so I targeted areas in the ditches which were relatively calm.

I quickly found that a fast retrieve was the ticket for success today.  A slow stop and go retrieve never got me a bite, but as soon as I picked up the pace, the fish started hitting again.

I hooked and released two more smaller sea trout and landed another nice over slot sea trout before calling it a day.

As it was getting towards dusk and the light was fading I spotted several big redfish cruising down the marsh canal and swimming into the ponds for the evening.

I made several casts to the fish and had one follow the Chug Bug but it turned away at the last moment.

I was heading out past "bobcat bay" and decided to make one last cast at the bend before calling it a day.

I shot a black back and silver Chug Bug as far as I could up the canal and started gurgling it back to the bank when a large sea trout blasted the plug.

The fish made a half hearted run but I put on the pressure to get the fish in as soon as possible.  As it was headed to the bank it veered off towards a brush pile but I turned the fish back as I again shimmied down the bank.

At night this gets interesting. You never know if a gator is in the vicinity eying you up for dinner.

Anyway, I landed the trout as my wife was calling me on the phone letting me know it was dark outside.

I didn't bother taking another pic of the fish because it was pretty ragged out, so I put it back into the canal to fight another day.

The mosquitoes and no see-ums weren't all that bad this evening but the damn green backed horse flies were viscous.  The actually draw blood when they bite.

Any fishing the ditches in the refuge is still productive so I hope to get out again tomorrow for some more action.

Till then, Tight Lines.