Fishing The Wales Tail

Went fishing a little earlier this afternoon along the Bio Lab Road flats down to the Whales Tail area with Karen and the "boys".

We got out to Bio Lab boat launch around 3:00 pm and only stopped at one area along the southern part of the drive to actually fish.

On the way, I stopped to buy a couple of bags of fresh dead shrimp and a bag of frozen fingerling mullet for bait from Mosquito Lagoon Bait and Tackle.   The owner said the fishing at Playalinda was in high gear. 

The surf fishermen were catching good numbers of whiting, pompano, and bluefish along the upper lot numbers.

If I hadn't had Elmo and Odie along with us, I would have tried the beach, but since they were along for the outing, I packed up the bait and headed to find an open spot along the drive.

We finally decided on an area in the southern part across from the Whale Tail flats and set out four spinning rods.

I put out two Okuma baitrunner spinning outfits with shrimp, and Karen tossed an outfit that had a Cajun Thunder rig with a shrimp below.

The weather was warmer than the past few days and there was a lot of vehicle traffic along Bio Lab.  There was a slight wind, but nothing that affected the fishing.

I was going to toss a topwater Chug Bug around while waiting for a bite, but I had a bite almost immediately after setting out my first shrimp.

I missed the fish and put on a fresh shrimp and sat down to wait for a bite.

Karen put Odie on a leash that he immediately hated, and Elmo sat in the truck for some unknown doggie reason while we fished.

I didn't wait long before I hooked up with a medium size catfish that I quickly released.  Only a few minutes later, Karen also picked up a larger cat.

I was hoping for a redfish or black drum so I tossed out another bait and waited instead of tossing a topwater plug around the area.

It didn't take long before I hooked and landed a large stingray.  The fish was about 2 feet wide and put up a decent fight when he realized it was hooked.

I clipped the tip of his stinger, unhooked the fish and set him free.

As the afternoon flew by, Karen and I caught several more catfish and a couple more stingrays, no redfish or drum.

At least we didn't get skunked.....

I noticed the absence of vehicles passing by and when I checked my cell phone found that it was almost 6:00 pm;  time for the refuge to close.

Karen and I quickly packed up our gear and headed to the exit.

The refuge managers close the area down at 6:00 pm sharp and I didn't particularly care to find out what would happen if we stayed past the magic hour.

I do know that they put up the wire rope barrier at the exit and close down the sliding gate entrance to the seashore pretty much on time every day.

Hope to get in some fishing tomorrow after taking care of the chores.

Till next time,

Tight Lines.