Monday, 1/23, Bill Daniel, Larry Flagg, Ken Holmes, Jack Ross, and Butch Adams fished offshore with me. We started out at the near-shore reefs, then moved to various spots to fish in about 45 feet of water. We used only light tackle and live shrimp, which made for some fun catches with good sized gag grouper. With gag season currently closed, we had to release them, but the guys had a great time catching three nice ones: a 32-inch, 13-pound gag; a 27 1/2-inch, 8-pound gag; and a 23-inch gag. We also caught ten sheepshead, two of which were 15-inch keepers, along with keeper porkfish and grunts. We released quite a few red grouper shorts, as well as mangrove snapper to 11 inches.

Wednesday morning, Mike McDonald fished Estero Bay with me. He caught a 17-inch black drum, a 16-inch sea trout and two 15-inch sheepshead, all on live shrimp. We released eight smaller sheepshead.

Tony and Tim Rolli, and friend, Ken Boemer, had planned to fish offshore with me on Friday. But the weather forecast was promising trouble on Friday, with probable rain and high winds and seas. With nothing booked on Thursday, I recommended we change their fishing date to Thursday, which worked out well for them. The trio caught three keeper mangrove snapper to 16 inches, some nice whitebone porgies, all about 15 inches, a mess of grunts, and a keeper hogfish. The grouper action was great again, as it had been earlier in the week, and we released three gags to 24 inches that would have been keepers, if not for closed season. We also released numerous gag shorts to 21 inches and red grouper shorts, all 18 and 19 inches, along with some short sheepshead. We used shrimp for all, 19 miles west of New Pass.

Friday was as promised: rainy and windy and rough. I remained in port. By Saturday morning, seas had calmed enough for me to get out to the near-shore reefs off Bonita Beach, where I fished a catch-and-release trip with Scott Severaid, Brian Matlock, Tim Brunkorst, and Tom Thoms. We used live shrimp to catch a 28-inch, 11-pound gag grouper and five would-be-keeper sheepshead to 19 inches. We released those, along with lots of smaller sheepshead and mangrove snapper.



I had planned offshore trips Monday and Tuesday, but another weather-front came through, bringing high winds and seas and small-craft advisories, causing me to cancel those two trips.

Captain Dave Hanson
Bonita Beach, FL
SW FL-Bonita Beach: Good Variety
August 22, 2011

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