Fishing Report for Pine Island Sound to Sarasota Bay, Florida

Capt. Butch Rickey
September 9, 2005
Pine Island Sound - Saltwater Fishing Report

REPORT FOR THE WEEK ENDING 9/10/05 by Capt. Butch Rickey

It was a short work week of three days. Fishing was pretty good for the most part, although we weren't always catching what we were after.

First up on Monday was my friend Dr. John Hitt. My most immediate concern for our trip was if the red tide that had been very bad last week, would still be around. The tide had left lots of fish floating, and killed lots of redfish on several flats. The other concern was bait.

We left John's dock at 7 AM, and headed down the river and out into the Sound. We ran all the way up to the flats south of Flamingo Cut, where I had been getting great bait. There was again lots of bait on the flat, but most of it was sardines, threadfins, and pinfish. There weren't many shiners. But, snook love those sardines, and we were catching some big ones. They'd do just fine.

Because the tide was outgoing and going to be fairly low, I decided to check on a place that I normally fish during the cooler months. As we pulled in to the spot we were treated to the sight of snook thrashing bait all over the place. I expect to see that behavior in the summer months when the snook are out on the beach. It usually comes late in the season. But, I don't recall ever seeing snook doing that on the flats. At any rate, we knew we had bunches of snook in this spot.

And, we had lots of bites, but John and I both missed many fish. They weren't big snook, and I actually think they were tail-striking those long sardines, and in some cases not getting to the hook. We managed to catch nine snook, a flounder, and a jack there.

At our next stop we couldn't muster a snook, but we did manage to catch another snapper and a gag grouper. We fished a pretty good stretch of shoreline catching only those two fish. We moved on, and decided to see if we could catch a few trout on the way home. We stopped on the flats at Picnic Island to play. There we caught some trout and some ladyfish, but nothing to invite to dinner. But, the last fish of the day was a furious fight, and had us wondering what we had hooked on a green and pink Bass Assassin. It turned out to be a 24 inch gag grouper on the flats in three feet of water. Not a bad way to end the day.

Wednesday, I had my first trip with Dave Tomala, of Joliet, Illinois. Dave is an avid bass and pan fisherman back home, and has done a little saltwater fishing. But, he'd never been out on the flats. Since Dave loves bass, I knew he'd love snook. After all, a snook is just a saltwater bass with a bad attitude and lots of horsepower.

We headed up to Flamingo flats, where we found lots of beautiful shiners waiting for us. It was still a mix of bait, but the shiners were a beautiful sight, running from four to six inches. We were loaded up pretty quickly, and on our way to the first spot.

Knowing the snook would still be where John and I had found them the day before, that was our first stop. The difference would be that we'd have a bit more of the last of the falling tide to fish, which was when John and I had our best bite. We could see snook busting bait as we made our approach.

It wasn't long before Dave had his first snook in the boat. The bite was pretty good. Several potential keepers got away, but we finally got our keeper on a pinfish I had out on a free-line down the tide. In fact, the tide had wrapped the line around a mangrove, and when the rod went off I thought it would be all over right then. I quickly raised the Power Pole and got on the trolling motor while Dave handled the rod. The fish was still there. The circle hook had done its job. We managed to get the line untangled from the mangrove branches and then Dave did a great job of keeping the snook from getting back into the root system. It was a nice 28 inch snook. We finished that hole with a good dozen snook and a gag grouper before moving on.

I decided to fish a snook spot in Matlacha Pass that I hadn't fished in a long time. I liked the timing of the tide to do so. The action was almost immediate there, too. With some live chumming we found there were lots of snook stacked up on the shoreline. They'd blast our chum, we'd catch two or three, and then we'd have to chum again. Sometimes they're like that, and that's the only way you can catch them. Dave missed his share, and had one nice fish at the boat that ran him into the running trolling motor. The prop hub picked up the line and violently reeled the fish in to the motor and ripped the hook from her mouth before I could turn it off. It didn't even break the line! Dave was bummed, but we did have our one allowed keeper safely in the well. We managed a good dozen snook there before calling it a day and heading for home.

Dave was certainly impressed with our snook. He assured me that he'd had a blast, and was trying to figure out if he could pull off another trip. We'd both had a great time, and I hoped we could do another trip before he went home.

Thursday it was John Hitt and me, again. I went into the day feeling very good about putting lots of snook in the boat for John. I felt sure I had them figured out.

The wind was definitely up from the north/northwest. It was really choppy on the flats catching bait. In fact, we had to dig out the Danforth anchor to keep the boat anchored. We got great bait again, but not as plentiful as the day before. We were ready to attack the fish.

Almost immediately we had a couple of big jack crevalle at our first stop. Then a couple of snook and a big trout. Then....nothing. The fish turned off. Oh, they were there in big numbers, but just refused to bite. Actually, that's not totally accurate. What they were doing was hitting our baits and knocking the scales off them, but not eating. Very frustrating when they do that, as you can't even feel it happen through a very expensive rod and Power Pro.

So, we moved on to Matlacha, and were greeted with pretty much the same situation. We got a few fish to bust our chum, and caught two or three, but that was it. We worked the area hard, but the fish just didn't want to play. We saw another guide pull in a short distance away. Of course, I kept an eye on them to see if they caught. They managed one snook.

We decided we'd see if we could catch some outsized trout at a spot I'd visited a couple of weeks ago. We found no trout at this spot, but were again getting hit and run snook bites. All of a sudden, we saw a big blow out a ways from the shoreline, that was unmistakably a big snook eating one of our get-away shiners. We pitched our baits to the spot of the blow as quickly as we could. Thump! Boom! Fish on! John did a masterful job of fighting the fish to boatside on the very light tackle, and the sight of the BogaGrip around her lips sealed the victor, and John's dinner. She was a beautiful 30 inch snook, and a great way to end the day. We did hit a couple of other flats, but the wind and bouncy conditions made it very hard to fish, and there were no bites. We called it a day. At half a dozen snook, a big trout, and a couple of jacks, we certainly hadn't slayed them, but it turned out to be a pretty good day in terms of quality fish.

As of now, I have three trips on the books for next week, as well. We've got some good looking full moon tides, so the potential for good redfishing is there. Stay tuned.

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