Snook In The Culverts

Happy Thanksgiving...

After eating a great Thanksgiving meal, my wife suggested that we take the "boys" for a ride around the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge.

I readily agreed and loaded up some rods along with Elmo and Odie who were ready to go.

The temperature was in the low 80s and for a change the wind wasn't blowing so I expected a lot of anglers to be out and about.

We crossed the A. Max Brewer Bridge and I was disappointed to see that there was a barrier up at the entrance to Gator Creek.

As we drove past the entrance, I was surprised to see that there was no barrier to East Gator Creek road but since I was going at a good clip, we voted on checking out the area around Peacocks Pocket boat launch.

We entered Pocket road and as we got to the shallow water launch, only one car was parked in the area. 

The water was calm so I pulled out a rod to briefly toss a small Chug Bug around the area while Karen watched the dogs.

Nothing was happening on top or on the Jerkbait I switched over to, so we loaded up and took off to check out Bio Lab Road.

The water in the lagoon is still brown from algae but is clearing up in some areas.

We traveled down Bio Lab and spotted a couple of fishermen on the bank fishing for redfish with live mullet and another group of people just having a good time at a pullover.

As we got close to the road to Playalinda Beach, I noticed that a barrier to a turnoff was taken down so I drove along the southernmost part of the lagoon to a spot where I used to fish for sea trout and snook.

 

I parked the truck and let the dogs loose to do their thing while Karen and I started fishing.

The culvert was open and flushing plenty of water and baitfish into the backwater.

I tossed out a D.O.A. Jerkbait a short distance in front of the culvert where some small baitfish were scattering and immediately hooked up with a small snook.

 

The fish put up a good fight for it's size so after taking a brief pic I released the fish.

The snook in the culverts and the nearby area were obviously targeting baitfish coming through the culverts but they were spooky as hell.

I watched several large snook in the 30" plus category blasting baitfish on the surface, so I started tossing a BadonkADonk around where they were hitting.  

After many unfruitful casts, I switched over to an XPS Slim Dog that more resembled the baitfish in the area but still didn't get any hookups.

 

I finally switched over to a small Creme Spoiler Shad paddletail bait and started catching small snook again.  The problem was that they were too small.

 

 

Karen was using the Jerkbait and missed a fish and then started using the paddletail bait on the opposite side of the culverts.  Unfortunately, the bite died down and the fish finally quit hitting.

 

I managed to catch and release four small snook an missed at least three more before we finally decided to pack it in.

 

When two gators about 10 to 11 feet long showed up on the scene, Karen was concerned about Elmo and Odie safety so we loaded the rods into the back of the truck and headed home.

 

It was around 5:15 pm when we drove onto Playalinda Beach road and headed to the house.

Although we didn't catch any of the really big snook, we both had a good time fishing with our "boys".

Till next time,

Tight Lines.