A Lazy Sunday Night Sport Shrimping

It was a lazy night sport shrimping on the Indian River this evening.

I didn't get a chance to wet a line this weekend and by this evening I was eager to get out of the house and hit the river.

I left the house around 7:30 pm armed with a small spinning rod rigged with an imitation shrimp.

Fifteen minutes later I was on the first fishing pier checking out what the sport shrimpers were catching this evening.

It had been raining all day long and it stopped shortly before I got to the fishing piers.  The air temperature was a pleasant 72 degrees and there was no wind on the water as you can see by the video below.

The lower fishing pier had a few shrimpers and no fishermen on it but the upper pier was more crowded at the shallow end.

I talked to a few shrimpers and to a man they all reported a slow evening.  Several had a few shrimp in their buckets but nobody was limiting out this evening.

The guys said they were averaging a couple of shrimp every ten minutes or so.  For this area it was a pitiful evening.

When I got to the piers an entertainer was singing away on the pavilion and despite the slow shrimping activity, everyone seemed to be having a great time.

I pitched my artificial bait at several sea trout that were hovering over the lights and caught two dinky trout before deciding to give it up.

When the small sea trout are schooling like they were tonight, you can be sure there are no big ones in the area.

I took several shots of the "inaction" and when it started to rain again, I decided to head for home rather than taking a chance of getting the flu, or worse.

Anyway, it was good to get out in the fresh air and enjoy the company of some of the locals.

Till next time,

Tight Lines.

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Some Shrimping Action On The Indian River

I decided to hit the pier this evening to see if anyone was getting any shrimping action on the Indian River.

As is my habit, I took along a light action spinning rod tipped with a shrimp imitation to see if I could pick up a sea trout or two.

The fishing piers were relatively uninhabited this evening so I took my rod and my trusty Samsung WB150F camera and headed for the lower pier.

The people close to the sea wall were netting shrimp but they were all medium sized, not the jumbos

that are expected in this area.

There were several schools of under slot sized sea trout chasing shrimp, so I took a short video of the action.

The shrimp that made it past the sea trout were being netted by the guys on the pier.  But from what I saw this evening, the sea trout were winning.

I took a few shots and met up with Glen Best, a fellow fisherman friend who also goes sport shrimping on a regular basis.  That's him to the left.

It turned out that a couple of weeks ago, Glen and his friend were the guys who I briefly spoke with in Catfish Creek Loop.

They were sitting in their truck waiting out the rain when I passed them, and had just doubled up on redfish in the marsh area. 

I stopped and shot the breeze with him a bit about the fishing in the area and how the shrimp were running.

While we were talking, I started pitching the shrimp imitation at some of the sea trout to see if I could pick up a legal size fish.

The more we talked, the more fish I caught.  Unfortunately they were all under the slot.

I took these videos of the fish and the picture of Glen that I promised to put on my site.


I continued catching fish and could have gone all night long, but after an hour or so I decided to head for the house.

I was working all day on remodeling my wife's bathroom and I was dog tired.

It was about 10:45 pm when I left the fishing pier and I was home by eleven.

As I was leaving the pier, I took some shots of the evening's catch.

 


If I finish getting the bathroom prepped and painted tomorrow, I might hit the beach and try for some Spanish mackerel or blues.

Till next time,

Tight Lines.

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Weekend Fishing Forecast

This weekend fishing forecast is dedicated to anglers in East Central Florida.

Today, as a new cold front pushes into the Gulf, NOAA’s National Data Buoy Center expects the winds to freshen out of the southeast.

This will result in winds up to 15 mph and seas of 4 to 6 feet.  Not too bad for offshore fishing, especially since the head boats out of Port Canaveral have been reporting nice catches of mangrove snapper, triggerfish, grouper, king mackerel and blackfin tuna up to 20 pounds.

Close to Port Canaveral, nearshore fishermen using live shrimp around the buoys are catching tripletail.

The 40-foot depths around Port Canaveral right now are where you should target redfish.  Some large schools of bull reds have been reported in these depths this past week just outside the Port.

Surf fishermen along the Space Coast using small clams for bait will be catching whiting, pompano, sheepshead and black drum.

Right now the pompano are scattered but roaming the troughs in small schools.  Don't stay in one spot too long.  If you don't start catching fish in a half hour or so move on to the next spot.  Pompano will be in one area one day and move on the next.

According to the guides, the Mosquito Lagoon has been hot during the morning hours between 9:00 and 11:00 am.

Redfish, seatrout and black drum have been cruising the eastern shorlines of the lagoon south of Oak Hill.  Sight casting and drift fishing with weedless lures or live shrimp has been the most productive tactic.

The Indian River Lagoon has been clearing up enough from the summer algae bloom for fishermen to take advantage of the sheepshead fishing around the docks and bridges.  Wade or drift fish with fiddler craps or small shrimp to catch these tasty fish. 

If you're a freshwater fisherman, black crappie fishing on the St. Johns river north of Puzzle Lake is your best bet this weekend.

The most productive method for catching these fish is to slow troll small curly tail grubs on a jighead. Chratreuse, white and yellow are good colors to try first.

A few shad are being caught, but not in great numbers.

I'm heading out to Playalinda to check out the surf.

Till next time,

Tight Lines.

Skunked By A Cold Front

Well I got skunked by a cold front this afternoon.

I should have known that it was going to be a bad day "catching" when the waterfowl in the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge were facing in the same direction.

Anyway, today was the first day all week that I got a chance to wet a line.

I left the house at 1:30 pm and was on the water 15 minutes later.

Since Peacocks Pocket road is closed to vehicle traffic until April of next year, I headed to a couple of spots on Catfish Creek Loop where I intended to dunk some fresh dead baits.

I immediately put out four rods with shrimp, cut clam and chunked ladyfish.

After fifteen minutes with no action, I started casting a gold Johnson's Sprite to see if I could stir up a follow or a fish.

This also didn't produce any action, so I started tossing a Chug Bug, a Zara Spook Jr. and several types of plastic baits.

After an hour I still had no bites but I decided to stick it out despite the lack of action.

I watched as these guys motored into the shallow cove from the boat launch but after spying on them for another half hour or so, I realized that they too were not getting any action.


They were casting the shoreline with something I couldn't make out.

I pulled out my trusty Samsung 18x camera and started taking pictures of the scenery and the waterfowl.

 

 

As I was putting the camera away, a Sheriff came by and we talked about the lousy fishing.

He told me that I was the only guy he saw fishing this area and on the main causeway nobody seemed to be catching anything.  He too attributed the bad fishing to the upcoming cold front.

After two hours very slowly rolled by, I decided to admit defeat and call it a day.

I pulled in my baits, packed up my rods and headed home.

On the way out I passed several fishermen enjoying the day but not catching any fish.

I decided to take East Gator Creek out of the refuge to see if I could spot and fish there but the shallow area was a dead calm with nothing moving around that I could see.

When I hit the main causeway, I called my sister in Allentown to wish her a happy birthday and whine about being skunked by a cold front.

Until next time,

Tight Lines. 

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Reds Along The Causeway

The reds along the causeway have been hitting cut baits, according to several contributors to this site.

Ed Stewart emailed me this report on 12/9 and picked up these fish the previous  Sunday morning, Wednesday night and Friday night.

The three reds he caught measured in at 38", 27" and 24" . 

All the fish were all caught on cut ladyfish along the Northeast and Southeast sides of the SR 406 causeway, past the new bridge.

I usually pass up this area because of all the jet skiers and para-sailers,  but

several other readers fish the area and always seem to catch fish.

Ed's catch is proof that you don't need a boat in our area to catch big reds unless you choose to fish the Mosquito Lagoon.

I do know that the stretch just past the Marine Patrol station up to the Refuge sign is a great place to set up and wait for cruising reds.

Since Peacocks Pocket road is closed until April, I may have to trade in my artificial lures for some shrimp and cut bait.

Till next time,
Tight Lines.

Thanks for the report Ed!

Weekend Fishing Blues

Didn't get a chance to any fishing until late Saturday afternoon and then only for a couple of hours.

The weather was great but the fish weren't cooperating worth a hoot.

I planned to fish artificials but stopped by the local bait shop and picked up some fresh dead shrimp to use as a backup.

The guy at the bait shop said that a couple of guys fishing Playalinda Beach came in with a report of catching several Spanish mackerel, a couple of Pompano and a "ton" of blues.  He said nobody had given a good report on catching redfish.

Since Peacocks Pocket road is closed for the season and I didn't want to stay away from the house too long to hit the beach, I drove through East Gator Creek road and around Catfish Creek loop to see if anything was going on.

At the barrier to Peacocks Pocket road, I spotted a small school of black drum but they were well out of casting range.  I wasted about a half an hour hoping for a bit on some dead shrimp but nothing was taking.

I continued down Catfish Creek loop and fished several likely looking areas with no success.

I finally stopped at a small pond where a couple of guys last week caught some reds.  I flipped out three baits and started casting a small Creme paddle tail swimbait around.

After about an hour, an old fishing friend of mine drove up and we chatted a bit about the fishing and an accident he recently had in Orlando. 

He was rear ended, sandwiched between a bus and was lucky to still be with us. 

He took a video of me landing a redfish last year in an area where he had been catching some black drum, but this afternoon he was having no luck.  

We parted ways and after about another 15 minutes or so I decided to pack it in and head home to see how my wife was feeling.

She is still recuperating from surgery but doing much better than she was.

I took some pics of the awesome sunset as I was leaving the refuge. 

Hope you enjoy.

Till next time, Tight Lines.

Sport Shrimping Post Thanksgiving Day

Sport shrimping on the Indian River this evening was pretty much only for the hardier types.

Thanksgiving Day is usually when sport shrimping picks up in this area.  At least in previous years that was the trend.

This evening was the first time in quite a while that I bothered visiting the two fishing piers on the river.

It was around 8:30 pm when I drove down to the bridge and it was extremely foggy.  The air temperature was 65 degrees, there was a fine misty rain falling and there was the usual breeze blowing over the Indian River.  Perfect pneumonia weather!

The band that was playing at the Pavilion earlier had already gone home and there were only a few vehicles in the parking areas.

The lower fishing pier was somewhat crowded, but the upper pier had only three people shrimping this evening.

Lower Fishing Pier

Upper Fishing Pier

 I talked to several people who were shrimping on the lower pier and most of the shrimpers had only a few medium size shrimp in their nets.  Nobody had a 5 gallon bucket limit.

I took a few pics of the area and proceeded to the upper fishing pier to see if they were doing any better.

The first guy I spoke with (below) was a "snow bird" who told me the shrimp were not running this evening.  Despite his report, I noted that he and his buddy had at least a couple dozen shrimp in their nets.

The folks shrimping next to him had done better.  They had at least two dozen shrimp each and were still netting them up as I was preparing to head for the comfort of the hacienda.

 




I took a few more pics before leaving and on the way home noted that the air temperature had dropped a couple of degrees.  Definitely a front moving in.

Perhaps that's why the sport shrimping this evening wasn't up to par.

In any event, I'll try to hit the area again in a few days for another report.

Till then,

Tight Lines and Heavy Nets.