Well, it seems the FWC's Commission wants to hold off making any rule changes for the red drum this year. The Commission has asked the Division of Marine Fisheries Management to hold off any more recommendations until the next red drum assessment is complete and that will be in November 2008.
What I'm afraid of is this, since they didn't make any decisions this year, we may be looking at more drastic measures after the next assessment. This is why everyone who targets these great fish needs to come to the public hearings and let their opinions be known. The FWC really does want to hear from the fishing public. Who they do get to hear from is the environmentalists and that's a lot. Now I don't have anything at all against the environmentalists but come on, the studies show the redfish are not in any emanate danger of becoming extinct. I also want to help to protect the redfish from unnecessary take of the breading stock and also from all the ones who are taken that are undersized but I believe there has been a great comeback for this species and if we all help we can keep this fishery healthy. Take only what's allowed by size limit as well as bag limit and be sure to release the oversized ones and undersized ones with care. Be sure they can swim off on their own power. Revive those oversized ones and vent if necessary.
RIVERS:Well, I guess you've heard that the best thing going on right now in the rivers are the larger croakers. People call them Virginia croakers because as they grow up - up river they begin to follow the shrimp out of the river in the fall and after reaching the ocean they proceed up the coast to Chesapeake Bay. Now there are no limits to these guys, size or bag but please take only what you are going to eat of freeze and eat later. I've had a couple of trips this week where people are going to use the croakers they caught for fish fry's this weekend and they're very good for that. The trips I had for that I had one guy and I caught 174 of them by 1:00pm and the next day three guys caught 166 of em and then we went flounder fishing. Yesterday I had two guys and we only fished for the croakers a little while and they caught 61. Now of course they didn't keep every one they caught. We only kept the larger ones. Out of the 174 he kept 124 and out of the 166 they kept 113. There's a few yellow mouth trout still around and some are real nice. Flounder was doing very good last week when the water temperatures dropped a few degrees and we were catching 7 to 14 of them per trip but yet again, the water temperature has come back up, (the wrong way to go) a few degrees, back to 80 yesterday so they as well as some of the other species slowed back down also. The flounder will pick back up again after next week's cool down. Speckled trout here and there but not as good as they're going to get in a few weeks. Bull redfish are in the river but not schooled up in the masses as they should be. Again, I think it's the water temperatures. A black drum or two here and there also but they'll really get better very soon too.
JETTIES:
Yes, I know, it's sheepshead time! One of my favorites but, the water temperature should be about 71 to 73 during this time of the month but it's running 80 and 81 so each time we get a slight cool down I head to the rocks but with no luck. One day I had two guys and after croaker fishing we went to the jetties and caught two sheepshead, two reds and one black margate. The next day after croaker fishing we went out there and caught two sheepshead then yesterday after the temps rose again we only caught one 18" drum. Those sheepshead have got to start soon.
Bull redfish are at the jetties now. They'd be a lot thicker if we had some pogies around but this year the pogies disappeared and never showed back up. A few of the mangrove snapper out at the rocks are nice but most are small again. Some legal sized black sea bass are chewing there also and some days the whiting bite is great and some days it's slower. Some real nice flounder out at the rocks now also, inside and out.
CREEKS:
Redfish and flounder in the creeks are your best bet if you're not croaker fishing. Nice redfish to 32" are being caught in the creeks now. When these flood tides begin to taper off the action will get even better. During the flood tides the reds can get up in the spartina grass flats and gorge on fiddler crabs and small blue crabs so much that when they come back down into the creeks as the tides fall they're not looking for much. Oh you can still catch them as we've been doing but it's slower than normal because most of the fish are full.
Flounder at creek mouths and shore lines where you have a good slope to it or roll downs where the water doesn't just drop off suddenly straight down but kinda rools down to the deeper area.
SURF:My surf fishing buddy tells me he's catching slot-sized redfish in the surf along with black drum, whiting and small bluefish and he caught a flounder the other day. So get out there and get em when you can. People on the Jacksonville Beach Pier are doing good now also.
Remember, let's keep our waterways clean. When I rode with the FWC a few weeks ago I couldn't believe how much trash, bottles, cans, bait paper, bait bags, grocery bags, food containers and discarded trash fish were all over the bridges. People!!! Clean up your own mess! You took it out there. Bring it back. There are trash cans in the parking lots. After our radio show last Saturday, I took a shovel and a bucket and went and cleaned up the bridges on Heckscher Dr. If it rains most of the day today, (like the forecast shows) I'll go and do the same thing. If someone doesn't clean it up it'll only wind up in the water when the wind blows it off the bridges. Somebody has got to do it, it might as well be me.
You can say what you want about the South but, you never hear of anyone retiring and moving up North,,,,,
Capt. Vic Tison
Web site: http://vic2fish.com/
904-699-2285
P.O. Box 28208
Jax., Fl. 32226-8208
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