Fishing Report for Pine Island Sound to Sarasota Bay, Florida

Capt. Butch Rickey
August 28, 2002
Pine Island Sound - Saltwater Fishing Report

REPORT FOR THE WEEK ENDING 8/24/2002 by Capt. Butch Rickey

There are three trips to report on this week. Here’s how it went.

My old friend David Bernot and his son Chris were first up on Tuesday. We had a good looking tide, and a breeze from the southeast at about 10. It took a while, but we got good bait at Picnic Island, chumming just inside the edge of the flat in about 4 feet of water.

Since Dave wanted some fillets for dinner, we began with trout. That’s usually the best way to insure there will be fish for dinner since snook season is still closed, and you can only keep one redfish per angler. We fished a flat near Regla Island and caught a number of trout, and put several nice keepers in the well.

From there we headed north into the Sound in search of redfish. We found some nice fish in a deep hole near a mangrove key, and caught about 5. Chris caught the fish of the week on my St. Croix Legend Elite, fitted with a new Stella 2500. What a sweet combo that is!

Once the action slowed on the reds we headed across the Sound in search of snook. The boys caught 4 or 5 before the tide quit running. Chris foul-hooked one that took off like a shot. We thought it was a really big fish at first. It’s amazing how hard a fish can pull when it is hooked in the middle of the body instead of the mouth.

We never got a big bite going anywhere, but had a pretty good day for mid-August. It is always great to see Dave and Chris. It’s amazing to see how much Chris has grown each year. He’s now twelve, and we’ve been fishing together since he was just a little kid.

On Friday I had my second trip with Malcolm Chatham and his lovely lady, Carolyn, of Houston, Texas. Malcolm’s first BarHopp’R trip was on one of the coldest, windiest weather days of last January, and he managed a beautiful snook on a TerrorEyez up in the river. I had to tease him about picking the two worse times of the year to visit; the dead of winter and the dog days of August.

We began with catching bait at Picnic Island, and it took a while. We then went for ladyfish and jacks on a flat near Regla. The fish were there, and we had fun with them. We also caught a trout. We saved several ladyfish for redfish bait.

We went to fish some holes in the north end of the Sound where there are almost always redfish. They were there. We could see them. But, we couldn’t get the first one to eat. All we caught were catfish, along with several nice sized trout that made dinner. We moved to a nearby island and fished a hole there, and Malcolm caught a nice red, a snapper or two, and a huge stingray.

We took off to do some looking for snook. We crossed the Sound, but didn’t find a snook that would eat before the tide quit. The breeze had completely laid down in mid-morning, and we were all stewing in our own sweat! We decided it was time to go to the Waterfront Restaurant for liquid and food. It was so bloody hot it was just unbearable.

Saturday morning I met my old fishing buddy Dr. John Hitt, over from UCF in Orlando for the weekend. John just loves to fish, and is happy catching just about anything. I knew we would find lots of action on the flats at Regla, so we headed straight there, and bypassed the bait catching, altogether. We caught a bunch of ladyfish, jack crevalle, and some nice trout on topwater plugs and jigs. Fun! We moved inside and caught a few more trout before heading up in the Sound for another attempt at the full moon redfish with ladyfish bait. Unfortunately, we had the same result as the previous day, and caught only catfish. The reds were lockjawed.

We headed across the Sound and found birds working just inside Redfish Pass. We stopped to see what was going on, and John was immediately into the ladyfish with his topwater plug. I tied on a TerrorEyez and caught a gag grouper, a blue runner, and some ladys. And, that was how we ended our day. Once again, the heat had become unbearable, and the action had stopped.

I have the week of August 25 scheduled off, so there won’t be a fishing report for next week. I have a full week the first week of September, so I’ll be back, then.

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