October 2007
10-8-2007
I snuck out yesterday by myself to get some fishing in for a few hours. I don't get to actually fish by myself a whole lot these days so it was a welcomed, relaxing, trip. My passion is fishing with artificial lures for redfish so that was the plan for the day. However, after I went through about a half dozen Gulp shrimp (because of the ferocious pinfish), I decided to switch to using pinfish for bait. I did get two redfish on the Gulps but the pinfish were just costing me money with every bait they shredded. So I took a small gold hook, cut up some Gulp shrimp into tiny pieces, and caught a half dozen pinfish. Two of the pinfish I caught were small so I used them live and cut the larger ones up into smaller chunks and used them as dead bait. The two live pinfish didn't last long while fished next to the mangroves while the tide was high. Each one produced a frisky 20-22" redfish. While I prefer a rising tide for redfish, today the tide was falling and as it dropped I fished off of the shoreline near and area that had scattered limestone rocks on the flat. The fish in this area really seem to like hanging around these rocks. I started cutting up the larger pinfish and the redfish really liked the easy meal. I ended up getting 8 reds between 18"-25". Granted they weren't big fish, but for only having a few hours, I was satisfied with the day.
No pictures today because of not having anyone with me to take them. But you probably wouldn't have enjoyed the pictures of the fish half as much as you have enjoyed seeing pictures of me jumping into the water to chase a brand new rod and real that I let jump out of the boat. The real highlight of the day was when I committed a cardinal sin by laying the rod down on the deck while I turned around to grab a drink out of the cooler. I heard noise and turned around just in time to see my rod jump off the deck into the water. I think I could have won America's Funniest Home Videos if someone had caught me on film leaping into the water, snagging my rod, and hopping back in the boat in less than 5 seconds. All I could think about when I got back in the boat was how often I had asked clients not to ever lay their rod down unattended. I guess the moral of the story is, "Do as I say, not as I do."
Tampa Bay Fishing
Captain Clay Eavenson
813-300-2147
http://www.captainclay.com/
gofishing@captainclay.com
