Fishing Report for Pine Island Sound to Sarasota Bay, Florida

Capt. Butch Rickey
October 18, 2006
Pine Island Sound - Saltwater Fishing Report

REPORT FOR THE WEEK ENDING 10/14/06 by Capt. Butch Rickey

The week began with two trips on the books, but ended with one. The week was a crazy one, as my father-in-law passed away. The funeral was scheduled for Thursday, which was my day with Peter Karas. We were able to move the trip to Wednesday.

This would be my second trip with Peter, and this time he brought his lovely wife Julie. I ran to the Waterfront Restaurant in St. James City, to pick up Peter and Julie. They were there early, as was I, and we were off to catch bait well before the sun was up. It felt gloriously good to be behind the helm of the Talon, again, as we ran through the darkness into a brisk breeze and the first light of the rising sun beginning to illuminate the water. It was beautiful. And, it was nice to know my gas leak was finally dealt with, at least for a few years.

Once we were set up on the flats Peter and I nominated Julie to do the chumming, since she was the rookie. She did a fine job of getting those baits chummed up, and we got plenty of shiners, pinfish, and threadfins. We were ready to fish in a hour. We were on our way to a slow day by our standards, but certainly a fun day with great folks.

Our first stop wasn’t too far from where we caught our bait. We had a tough tide to fish. It was outgoing all morning long, and the water was blowing out of there! But, we managed to catch 4 snook, 3 jack crevalle, and a ladyfish before moving on.

We headed up into the Sound, and I decided to hit a spot in Ding Darling along the way. The water was moving swiftly, but the fish were having nothing to do with us, and Peter managed only one snook. After working a pretty good piece of shoreline that usually gives up nice fish, we moved on.

At our next stop we were looking for meat. Peter told me he’d like to take some fish home, if possible. The tide was getting down to the point where I thought we might have some quality speckled trout pushing off into the potholes. We did find trout in a favorite pothole of mine, but they weren’t interested in doing much more than harassing our baits, and we only caught one. Again, we were on the move.

At our next stop we were again hunting snook. The snook were there, but we couldn’t manage to get more than two of them to take a bait. At this point, I just wanted to put Peter and Julie on some action. I got to thinking that the grouper might be on the move back into the backcountry, and decided to check them out. We wound up with a pretty good gag grouper bite, and Peter had more fun with those juvenile grouper than he did all day. They are really tough fighters for their size, and a blast on light tackle. Julie lost several in the rocks we were fishing, as did Peter, but it was a fun way to end the day.

And, we ended our day right where it had begun; at the Waterfront Restaurant over a great lunch. It had indeed been a good day, and really great to spend another day with Peter, and meet Julie.

Next week will be a busy week, with five trips on the books. The tides are descent, so it the weather behaves and the red tide stays away, maybe fishing will be on the upswing! Stay tuned.

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