The Black Drum Are In The Creeks

After taking care of some work around the house, my wife and I decided on the spur of the moment to go fishing and try and catch some Black Drum.

It was around 4:00 pm before we finally loaded the truck and headed for the Indian River.  

We decided to hit the local bait shop to pick up some live shrimp,  so we stopped at Captain Hooks on Garden Street and picked up a baker's dozen of "bombers".  

These are super size shrimp in the jumbo  plus category that are great for gator sea trout, snook and big redfish.  

I didn't have a bait bucket so we used the cooler I brought along to keep our drinks in.  

We drove into Gator Creek road and into Catfish Creek Loop and decided to fish a point where I have caught reds in the past.

I baited up a jumbo shrimp for Karen on her spinning outfit,  then set out three bait casting rods  with live and dead shrimp and sat down to wait.  (Not one of my better traits.)

After a few minutes I had a hit on the rod with a smelly shrimp on it but missed whatever was dumb enough to try and eat it.

I re-baited with a live shrimp and after several minutes picked up an undersize spotted sea trout which I quickly released.  Shortly after that, I landed another sea trout that was the smallest I ever caught in salt water.  The little trout was no longer than 6 " and when Karen wanted to take my picture with the trout, I quickly vetoed the idea.

While I was unhooking the little trout, Karen hooked a black drum on a bait casting rod I asked her to watch.  

The fish put up a "sloshing" fight that was atypical of a drum and when she landed the fish we knew why.  The juvenile drum had its tail removed by some predator, probably a dolphin looking looking for a drum dinner.

Tailless Drum

Tailless Black Drum

I took a couple of pics of the tailless fish before  releasing it.

In the next half hour just as dusk was on us, I hooked and released two more black drum and another as it got dark.  All the drum were caught on either live shrimp or some smelly dead shrimp I brought along that was cluttering up the freezer.

We released all the fish and when it got too dark to see, we decided to head for home.   Except for the one black drum that Karen landed, she never got a hit on the live "bomber" shrimp she was using.

Apparently I was in a small school that was just a few feet away from where she had her rod staked out.  The other two bait casting rods I had out never got a hit either and they were to the right and left of where I was catching fish.

We were hoping to catch a redfish, but I couldn't complain about the fishing.  The tally was two sea trout and three black drum in the 22' to 25" range.

After I get through with my projects tomorrow, we'll probably go out again and wet a line or two.

Till next time, Tight Lines.