Back to the Beach !
Capt. Larry Pentel
September 28, 2008
Destin - Saltwater Fishing Report
After being gone "to Yankee Land" for over a week I am happy to be back at the beach catchin' fish.
My trip to Maine was fun, had beautiful scenery and it was nice to visit with my daughter. I have never seen so much pretty water with NO fish in it though! The Tuna trip I thought we had chartered was shut down by the captain - he said " No fish this year, I'm not running any charters". and that was it- no lets try something else or anything. I went through all the tourist magazines and only found a handful of saltwater guides- none of whom returned my calls. I finally called a Fresh water guide, Capt Clifton Ames with Ten Mile Guide Service. He was pleasant, talkative and more than willing to take my son (capt Will) and I Bass fishing the next day. Naturally we fished the day a cold front blew through with 25 knot winds and a high blue sky and even higher barometer. capt Clifton did a great job of finding places out of the wind that held a few Bass willing to co-operate, both Small and Largemouth. We had a fun afternoon and I would recommend his guide service to anyone who finds themselves on the central Maine Coast and needs a fishin' fix. After all, you can only spend so much time eatin' lobster or looking at yet another lighthouse!
A different brand and colder conditions!
Meanwhile, back at the beach- It seems the first 5 days I was gone had fish-able weather and a good bite of fish from Ike. The last 6 days had been to rough for anyone to go and I made it back just in time for the first fish-able day in a while. We got home Wed. night and I was out Thurs. morning with a charter. The wind was stiff from the NE so we hugged the beach and ran down a bit to stay inshore. The plan worked and my folks landed a great catch on a half day including 4 nice gag grouper. Seems they hadn't fished in several years and were already talking about going again while I was cleaning the catch
A beautiful sight after being off the Gulf for over 2 weeks!
Friday gave us a slick calm morning so we blasted offshore about 7 miles. LOTS of snappers everywhere and even a few of those tasty triggerfish showing up on plenty of spots. The little shark was the high point of my anglers day tho. The fellow that caught it (and the Grouper) quit fishin' a hour into the trip- said he was happy and was going to let the other 3 catch up! We were steady catchin' and releasing fish our whole 4 hours!
Maybe a 5th of what we released!
Yesterday I ran around and "looked" a little bit after having an idea of where the fish had moved to. My plans paid off as we found a big school of amberines and boxed a bakers dozen of the feisty jacks. We kept some good snappers early in the trip only to have to throw back one over 10# toward the end since we had already limited out. The one at the far right in the picture is in the 12-14# range tho and was the last one we kept so nobody felt too bad!
One of the few trips where the gals got out fished by one of the guys!
Overall there are plenty of fish around. I did not have any King bites but one of the other Grayton boats had a couple nice ones on Thurs. so there are a few here- The triggers are definitely starting to bite and I saw several BIG stands of 'em where we just caught a couple and then went to losing bait. The catches of "Fuds" should just get better over the next 2 months. While we didn't find any "piles" of grouper on 1 spot we had several more good ones bite each day than what we landed- There seem to be quite a few of the hard pullers scattered around. All 3 of these trips were half days and I was trying to hit as many species as possible in just 4 hours and didn't "target" any one. With the moon almost dark the grouper catches will probably get better as it heads closer to full-- I can see a box full trip a good possibility in the next 2 weeks.
A day off today to wirte this and catch up up ALL that other stuff that piles up while your gone and back in the water tomorrow- wish I was out there today!
capt Larry Pentel
More Fishing Reports:
