Evening Redfish

Friday evening proved to be productive on the redfish front.

The evenings fishing excursion in the Merritt Island National Wildlife Preserve was something I was looking forward to.

After putting in a good bit of windshield time at work this past week, it was nice to chill out and get some quality fishing time in with my wife and wonder dog, Elmo.

I picked up a couple pounds of small, heads on, Canaveral shrimp from our local fishmonger and proceeded to some of our proven fishing spots.

As usual, I used my trusted top water plugs and jerk baits, but this evening I obviously wasn't holding my mouth right because the only fish I could dredge up was a medium sized ladyfish and one small trout that looked like he was starving to death.

My wife, on the other hand did quite well with a nice slot redfish that ate her shrimp and headed up river. The fish was gut hooked and even though we tried to release her unharmed, it wound up on the dinner table.

I didn't mind too much. I love blackened redfish.

Enjoy the pics, and here's hoping for a better Saturday evening trip.

Tight Lines!

Mid May Fishing On The Indian River

Hot weather this weekend, and work around the hacienda, prevented me from checking out the Mosquito Lagoon fishing.

So, late Saturday afternoon, my wife and I took Elmo for a ride down to the Merrit Island National Wildlife Preserve.

There were not as many people in the area fishing as I would have thought, and those that were enjoying the weather, didn't seem to be catching much.

Undaunted, I
Undaunted, I proceeded to jump fish the areas around Catfish Creek and the area around Peacock Pocket.

I was using a D.O.A. Terror Eye with nothing to show but a trout a little bit larger than the lure.

My wife and I chased several redfish and finally scored one on a dead shrimp that she was using under a "Billy Bay" Pop N Gurgle in shallow water.

I continued with the D.O.A. and several other
lures with little to show for my efforts other than the beginnings of a sun burn.

We finally hit a stretch alongside the Indian River that we call "Snook point", and for good reason.

Opposite the point in the adjacent canal, I finally started getting some good trout hits.





Fishing in about 2 feet of water with a Creme paddle tail swim bait, I picked up about nine trout in 20 casts. The fish were scrappers, but only two over the legal limit.



I grabbed my Nikon Cool Pix, and snapped a couple pics of the fish and some early Spoonbills for posterity.

We are expecting some rain this week which hopefully will raise the water level in the river a bit.

The flats fishing is still pretty great around this area but some rain should give it a bump.

Hope you all enjoy the scenery and until next week; tight lines to all.