August – another crazy month. Yet again I was on the water just about everyday!
A quick synopsis:
Inshore/Backwaters: After a decent july, the drum bite really picked up in early august and continues to get better every day. Our average is up to 9 slot fish per half-day (all on artificials) – that’s a darn good average. Plus, the shrimps are out in good numbers (we’ve been easily able to cast net 5-10lbs most days) and the drum are really starting to bust on them…and more shrimp will pour in on the moon tides and the reds will get more and more aggressive as the weather begins to cool. Wicked bait-busting action is just around the corner!
Nearshore: Besides the continued awesome shark fishing – the spanish mackerel fishing has been epic during the past month. There have been big fish eating live baits on teh wrecks and on morning with high tides – there have been awesome numbers of big 2-5lb fish smashing bait in the inlet and on the beach. We had a few half days during which we landed 30+ 2-4lb spanish using light spinning tacklewith maria plugs, soft-plastics, spec-rigs, topwater chuggers – and fly-rods. Awesome stuff. The king bite has also started to pick up nicely lately.
Offshore: I’ve only been a few times, and we’ve found some kings, some small dolphin, AJs and tons of cudas. My hallmark trip of the month during the middle of the month when we hooked up a few dolphin, a few hoos and hooked a blue marlin on a TLD-15 (the fight lasted less than 5 seconds). Pretty awesome site!!
The drum fishing has been pretty awesome lately – so awesome that Katie and I have been sneaking out just about every chance we get to catch a few reds and cast-net some shrimp for dinner…
10lbs of shrimp..
I even get to catch a few now and then!
8/25 – This morning Travis and I fished a half-day looking for some reds – and we found a bunch of fish and even caught a few. Spinnerbaits, as usual, were the ticket and we found fish just about everywhere we went – we got a few in the boat, lost a few, and saw a ton – we even sight cast to a few with spinnerbaits and got them to hit! Awesome – can’t wait to have you back in the fall!
8/24 – This evening we had a big group – 6 old friends, 3 guides and 3 boats. I fished with Keith and his buddy. We moved around a lot and picked away at the reds all evening. We did find a huge concentration of shrimp – enough for cast net as much as we could have wanted but the guys weren’t interested as they aren’t shrimp eaters…so we opted to fish hard. We boated 6 reds and a flounder – and lost several more. It was a
really nice evening – and i have to admit, I won the battle of the guides š
8/22 – Tonight I had the absolute pleasure of fishing with Walter and his lovely family. We got along great and had an absolutely fantastic evening – finding fish everywhere we went. In this half-day we boated 11 slot reds with fish ranging from 18 to 27 inches. Fantastic!!! I hope I see y’all again in the future!
8/21 – Today I had a great time fishing with Scott and his friend – we tried to see if we could find a few spanish in the inlet (or sharks) but struck out pretty quickly finding 15-20 knot winds and a very nasty swell rolling straight in – not good conditions. So we went to plan B – backwater fishing. It wasn’t red hot, but we found a good smattering of fish – putting 6 or so in the boat in the early evening. Awesome man – i can’t wait to get you on board next summer (or for november albies!).
8/19 – Today I met some great people – Anthony and his wife Angela. They came down for a last minute trip and I just happened to be open – and we had a great time together. We tried to find a few flounder early (no dice) and moved on to the reds – Anthony, who had never caught reds before, was very quickly hooked. We boated 8-10 slot reds in the afternoon (around the high tide), including 2 that were over slot, a 16″ flounder and 8lbs of shrimp that I cast net in less than 15 minutes! I can’t wait to see y’all again this sept and october!
Okay – before anyone says anything…I know I am a scrub who needs to shave and get a haircut. That’s what happens when you work 47 of 50 days!
8/15 – On this short AM half-day, it was slick calm and I took out Randy and his son and nephew…and we never left the inlet. In 3.5 hours, we put over 40 spanish in the boat that were 18-26 inches (1.5-4lbs), countless bluefish and even a nice big bluerunner. The action was non-stop and we had spanish skying all around the boat the entire time. AWESOME! Good job guys!
8/14 – I wish I some photos of this day.Slick calm – a boat load of big spanish to 4lbs, several fat flounder and we even saw a sailfish “finning” (his entire sail out of the water) less than 2 miles off of the beach!! Needless to say – I had two very happy folks onboard. It was great fishing with you Tim!
8/13 – I only have 1 photo for today – a monster 60″ cuda. What a day it was too – let me put it this way, we had a lot of action but not a lot of catching. We landed 6 or so cudas, a mahi (and lost 3 or 4 due to a plethara of issues that were everything from angler error to tackle malfunctions)…we also broke off a nice little wahoo right under the boat and had a monster mercury missle of a ‘hoo (60lbs+) saw through the leader only 10 feet from the gunnel. What was the kicker? We hooked a blue marlin on a TLD-15 – it only lasted 5 seconds and never took the hook…but he gave us one incredible jump barely 50 yds behind the boat. Best part? Everyone saw it – and we were only in 120 foot of water. It was mill-pond calm and while we lost a lot of fish today….we got to see some amazing stuff.
8/12 – Today I had one of my favorite anglers – crazy Craig…except he brough along his even crazier grandpa today. Needless to say – we got along very well. The fishing wasn’t as red hot as the day prior – but we got 5 nice slot reds in the boat (all over 21 inches with the biggest right under 27″). Look forward to fishing with you guys this October for some specks!
8/11 – MAN – What a day! I don’t feel bad saying this as Jay and his son were the first to admit it – but they are relatively inexperienced fishermen and they had never fished inshore saltwater ever before.
8/10 – Tonight the plan was to go do a little blind casting for some reds and then go looking for some tailers on the high tide. We started off doing well – we saw some fish busting shrimp and Mike and his uncle landed a couple slot fish, pulled the hooks on the 3 or 4…..and then a massive thunderstorm rolled in, ruining our evening. We had to call it quites early and i had to outrun a wicked downpour. It was quite fun, actually. We didn’t get to look for any tailers, but we had some good fishing in the short time we were out!
8/3 – Today Bob and I went looking for reds and I was hoping to see some fish start busting shrimp – and we found a whole bunch of shrimp and a whole bunch of reds busting on them. Bob is a great fishermen and did very well – on his own, he landed 8-10 slot reds (i cant remember the exact number) and I was able to also catch several. We also got to see a good number of fish busting schools of shrimp in the grass – and that’s an awesome site (it sure gets my blood pumping for september!!)
8/2 – Today was an interesting day – we were hoping to get out and find a few kings, maybe a dolphin, AJs, anything. Just 6 miles off the beach…it started off hot – lots of biat, several good drag-screaming strikes including a fish that completely dumped a TLD-20 in several intense runs (experience says it was probably one of those huge rouge wahoo that are ocassionally hooked nearshore). However, we had some sick crew members and had to come inshore. I was able to salvage the day and we found a great big spanish bite and i was able to chum them up no problem – we had 12 or 13 strikes and landed 6 or 7 nice, big 3-5lb spanish mackerel before we had to end the day quite early Regardless, great group of folks and i hope y’all decide to try it again next summer š
8/1 – Today I had one of my favorite clients – Dave Z for PA. This was our second day in a row fishing together and today he brought some faces – hsi two brothers. Things started off a bit slow and then we found a beast – a monster 32″ fish that really put the quantum drag to the test…and then, after that, we were in fish for the entire afternoon. We then picked away at them all day, boating over 20 slot reds between the 3 guys – all on spinnerbaits. We almost had a triple header pick – but i i did a bad job of netting Mike’s fish š³ Awesome seeing you again Dave – and I look forward to next year (and perhaps the fall).
