Horseshoe Crabs Spawning

This afternoon my wife wanted to get something to eat from Arby's so we loaded up Elmo and Odie and headed to the local fast food store to pig out. 

We decided to take a drive around Gator Creek road to eat our sandwiches and to see if the work crews from the wildlife refuge had improved the road. 

As we crossed the A. Max Brewer bridge we saw that the kite surfers were out in force and I knew it wouldn't be a great day for bank fishing. 

 As I drove past the barrier into Gator Creek road, we saw the sandy shoreline covered with horseshoe crabs spawning and water birds stuffing themselves on their eggs.  

Click on the first pic below for a short video of the action.

I hadn't seen horseshoe crabs gather like this for quite a while, so I stopped eating my two for $6.00 fish sandwich and took a few pics of the crabs. 

 After we got through eating our lunch, we drove around to see if anybody was catching any fish before heading home.

We saw three groups of people dunking shrimp for black drum but the only thing they were catching was catfish and stingrays.

I wanted to see if there was any topwater action along East Gator Creek road so we headed into it on the way home.

There were no signs of any topwater action but we did spot a ton of gators on the bank and in the shallow flats.

One particular bruiser on the bank was in the 12 to 14 foot category, so I took a pic before heading out of the area.  Gators like this on is why you should never get in the water in this area.

Before we got out of East Gator Creek, Karen and I counted a total of 14 gators.

Good reason to name the area "Gator Creek".

Till next time,

Tight Lines