46-pound No-Motor Zone Redfish
Capt. Tom Van Horn
April 24, 2008
Indian River Lagoon - Saltwater Fishing Report
Indian River Lagoon Coast Fishing Report, April 24, 2008
Compliments of Mosquito Creek Outdoors in Apopka Florida
First, let me apologize for the tardiness of this report. This past weekend I was off of the water attending the Coastal Angler Magazine Fishing and Boating Expo in Melbourne, Florida. Although the weather was nice, we still had great turnout, great speakers, and a great show. Yes, nice weather on the same weekend of a fishing show typically draws attendees away, but in this case, our attendance was good. We also conducted another Hook Kids on Fishing event on Saturday, which was a ton of fun and a tremendous success.
My adventures last week started out with the pleasure of sharing a three-day charter with father and son team Rico Panilo and Rico Jr. from New Jersey. Our plan was to mix it up a bit by targeting a different style of fishing each day.
On our first day we launched out of Kennedy Point in Titusville for some sight fishing for redfish and sea trout, and the catching was tough. We had some shots at tailing redfish early out, but after a hard day of fishing we ended up with a good number of ladyfish and small sea trout. The schools of ladyfish have moved into the north IRL and they are working schools of glass minnows under terns and seagulls.
On our next day we opted to fish near-shore out of Port Canaveral in search of tripletail and cobia, and again we had a tough day managing only one tripletail, a spadefish, one flounder, and a sheepshead.
On day three we ventured into the freshwater arena targeting schooling bass on the St Johns River near Lake Harney and again the fish weren't jumping into the boat, but Rico Jr. did manage some decent size largemouth bass and a 5 pound southern flounder of all things caught on a live menhaden. Oh by the way, we ended up taking the flounder to lunch at the Jolly Gator Fish Camp, where the nice folks whipped up some tasty blackened flounder sandwiches, yum.
On Monday I guided a group of three into the Banana River No-Motor Zone where we caught a good number of sea trout and ladyfish on top water plugs. The bite was fast and furious at first light with our best results coming from Storm Chug Bugs and Rapala Skitterwalks fished in 2 to 3 feet of water. As the day grew longer and the wind picked up, we decided to chunk out a few ladyfish, and managed a 36-inch and a 47-inch redfish. The larger redfish was 47-inches long with a girth of 28-inches, and using the standard fish weight calculator measured out to be 46.06 pounds
As always, if you have any questions or need more information, please contact me.
Good luck and good fishing,
Captain Tom Van Horn
Mosquito Coast Fishing Charters
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407-416-1187 on the water
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Target Species:
Redfish, Sea Trout, Black Drum, and Cobia
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