Blast Off with some nice catches

Fishing Forecast Jacksonville, St Augustine, Ponte Vedra and Fernandina Florida-1.jpg

front row - Tommy Scott and Liam McCall. Second row - Darius Wilson, Kieran Wallace and Jerald Jackson.


What a great time of the year Spring is. Bait on the move, weather warming and fish biting. The past few weeks have been pretty darn good with several species fired up and for those wanting a fun time and a few meals, a nice box of fish.

The nice size keeper black drum are in the river and at the jetties and with a fresh big ole shrimp or a 1/4 blue crab fished on the bottom can provide lots of string stretching. These guys hang right on the bottom so that is where you need to have your bait. I see so many people fishing in this deep current strong water with not near enough lead to get to the bottom and stay there and they are just wasting their time.

Here is a tip to be sure your bait is in the right spot (on the bottom) when fishing for bottom fish, like black drum. Put on what you think is enough weight and your bait and send it down. One it hits bottom, stop letting line out and hold the rod for a few seconds, say about 5 to 10. Now gently lift the rod tip up and slowly let it back down. If you feel the weight hit the bottom when you lower your rod you are good. If you do not feel the weight hit bottom, you need more weight.

I usually use way more weight than I really need to stay in contact with the bottom but the current does not move at a constant speed and by using more weight than I need, I am always in contact with the bottom.

My rig usually consist of a 4 to 10 ounce weight, a leader of about 1 to 2 feet in length and a Daiichi Circle Wide 3/0 to 5/0 hook with a 1/4 to 1/2 blue crab for bait. Once I send this out, I place the rod in a rod holder and hurry up and wait. Sometimes the fish will double the rod over and sometimes the fish will sort of play with the bait before sucking it down. I have found that I catch more of these fish by waiting until the rod is bent before taking it out of the rod holder. When using a Daiichi Circle wide hook, I DO NOT set the hook when I think I have a fish. The key to more hookups with these hooks it to turn the handle as fast as you can or lift the rod tip slowly until you feel the fish pull back. Try this and you will catch more.

I mentioned shrimp as a bait BUT everything in the water eats a shrimp, so be ready for an occasional toad fish or other non-desirable species when you have shrimp on the hook. But you have to have at least one rod with shrimp because sometimes the drum want only shrimp. Now I am a long way from stating you will not catch toadies on crab but usually a lot less than if you are using shrimp.

These fish can be found in the deep drops in the river where there is some sort of hard bottom, like oysters, clams or rocks. One more thing to mention is bring more than one hook and one sinker because you will loose some tackle dropping you rig in this narley bottom but that is where the fish are so just bring a little extra tackle.

The big reds have also moved into the river and at the jetties and these can be captured using the same rig as the drum. Yesterday, I was fishing for drum and with the nice drum, I also caught several big oversized reds.

Over the past few days we have had a real nice concentration of yellow mouth trout in the river. I found these at one of my float fishing spots while targeting speckled trout and then fished a few more places where I have in past years caught them and with a little effort I managed to boat a nice box of these up to around two pounds. A dead shrimp fished on the bottom works great for yellow mouth. Sometimes I will take the first one and cut it up into one inch by one inch strips and use this for bait. These are a very aggressive fish that will eat almost any bait. Look for areas that have structure where the water is around 15 to 40 feet deep. These fish will also attack a Gotcha trout tail and when they are there thick, this makes for a lot of fun fishing.

I have also had some real nice whiting in the river and I think if you can find a place that holds a few of these hard pulling fish, you might be able to work that general area and end up with a mess of them to bring home to the hot grease. A big plate of these fried up crispy with some hush puppies and cole slaw, will make a fantastic meal. If you do this, call me about an hour before they are done so I can come help you eat them.

As of this report, the sheepshead are still biting pretty good at the jetties and a fiddler fished around the rocks will provide some nice catches.

The ocean has been sort of slow this past month but I think by the time this hits print, some nice catches of mahi will start showing up at the dock.


Capt Jim's Fun Fishing Inc.
17184 Dorado Cir
Jacksonville, Fl 32226
904 757 7550
www.hammondfishing.com
jim@hammondfishing.com