RJ October Fishing Weekend 10-19-13

Fished with RJ this weekend so I should have enough for two blog postings.  We started off Sat morning on a flat I know pretty well now down at the fort.  It wasn't long until we were in fish on top-water.  We caught quite a few trout in and around the deeper potholes on the flat since the tide was pretty low.  We ended up with quite a few trout some pinfish, mangrove snapper and ladyfish.  We did fish a few potholes with some cut bait and only caught catfish though I did most of the catching of those little boogers.  We didn't really have many solid bites but trout were on that flat but most were smaller fish. 

So after watching another boat burn the flat looking for redfish I thought it was time to move into the mangroves as the tide was pushing in.  We got inside the large cut with everybody else fishing on Sat as well.  My first spot had a kayaker sitting in it so we let him have that oyster bar and started a little south and started looking for fish.  It wasn't long before we found a nice trout that promptly got off at the boat and some sheepshead which seriously disappointed RJ for me to release, but they punch holes into my fish bag so back in water they went.  We drifted a little with wind along the mangroves and another 2 boats came into the same 300 yard shoreline.  Well since we were stacked in there pretty tight we decided since there were fish flashing and pushing bait up against the mangroves we were all right and it wasn't long before RJ had his first snook of his career.

Yea it wasn't the big snook that we were seeing but it was a snook.  It wasn't long before the cut cleared out and we were able to move around a little easier without bumping into other boats.  We did see some larger snook moving around at the same point I had seen them a few weeks ago so, but we thought it would be better to move on down to some broken water that I had found a few weeks ago with Dr. Schuster.  The water was full of life with 1000s of mullet but we really weren't getting in bites other than pinfish even though we were seeing some redfish mixed in with the mullet so I got some cut bait and put it out in a smaller pot hole and waited.  After a few minutes I got a pretty heavy thump and pulled in dinner for the evening.

I think it went a little over 26 inches and a perfect tournament size fish but even better for dinner.  We sat there for quite a while longer and other than a 3 1/2 foot bonnet head we really didn't catch anything else even though there were so many mullet and so much activity.  We putted back over the area we started in since the tide was falling and after catching a couple of trout on the way in we put some shrimp out in the holes off the mangroves looking for those big snook that had hopefully settled in those holes during the tide change.  It wasn't long and I got past the pinfish and got a big tug on a shrimp on jighead.  bRight away I knew it was something with a little more size.  I thought snook at first since it peeled off but it wasn't long before I saw the chrome flash.  Another overslot redfish at the fort.  It's beginning to be my MO when I go down there and I'm not complaining but you can't eat a fish that big but luckily we had dinner already so I was happy to get to fight that fish.  I think it went somewhere around 29 inches and it was just barely hooked (we think the hook got dislodged when RJ landed it but still!).

After that it was getting pretty late and we knew we needed to get home and clean a fish and cook some dinner.  So after some redfish tacos and some quality beer that RJ brought we watched a little football and avoided the highlights of the UGA game.  We both were worn out and in bed early to get back after it again on Sunday.