Two Friends & Twenty Five Redfish!
Capt. Mike Pankey
August 23, 2008
Panama City - Saltwater Fishing Report
August 18th:
I would like to start off the report by saying thank you to Rich and Dave for another outstanding fishing trip!!
Rich contacted me on Saturday looking for a trip for himself and one of his co-workers, both of which, were here on a convention for General Electric. Rich had been told that I was the guide he was looking for if he wanted to fish "BIG" live baits for trout and redfish!
Rich explained to me that he had lived in the Tampa area and had done alot of Redfish and Snook fishing on his own. But Dave, however, was from Kansas and had never seen or caught a Redfish. We met at the boat ramp at 6:00 am... I had 57 hand sized pinfish and pigfish in the livewell ready to go (as usual). As we eased up the bay, I noticed what seemed to me to be an unusual amount of wildlife activity. There were mullet jumping everywhere, Osprey diving on fish, and we even passed an alligator about 8 to 10 feet long. Over the years I have found that when you see this amount of activity, you typically have a good chance of having a stellar fishing trip...and that we did!!
We spent about 15 minutes getting perfectly positioned into the fishing spot and finally eased the anchor out. I don't think Rich was prepared for what was about to happen, and I know Dave wasn't for he was still talking about catching crappie. I got out the rods and put a pinfish on both of them and pointed out where to throw them. Within thirty seconds of the baits hitting the water, we had a double header going.
After catching several redfish in the 23" to 26" range, Dave was absolutely amazed at how hard a redfish can pull and commented that he had never caught anything like that before. I then put a big pigfish on Rich's hook and told him
"let's see if there is a trout out there?" He threw it up to the edge of the grass and seconds later...it got thumped. Rich set the hook and you could tell it was a good fish. I was not sure what he had, but was hoping it would be a good trout to go along with the fine redfish we were catching. Rich fought the fish for a while and then I heard the ever famous, jaw popping sound a big trout makes when he is trying to get rid of the bait. When Rich got him up to the boat, I put him in the landing net and Rich started to flip out about how big the fish was. After a quick trip to the scale and the check-it stik, he measured 25 3/4" and weighed 5 lbs 3oz.
With Dave being from Kansas and not knowing what a redfish was... before now, he was pretty blown away by the spots on them and the theory of why they have spots. By now, they had both caught a couple of fish with multiple spots, but it wasn't long before Dave hit the mother load...a 25" redfish with seventeen spots!
Rich followed up shortly after that with a nice fish with nine spots.
I could tell this trip was starting to turn into a competition by Rich rubbing it in that he had the biggest fish, and Dave taking claim to having the redfish with the most spots, and both arguing who had caught the most fish at this point.
By this time, Dave made a comment about how big the baits were, and could not believe that these fish were eating them. Rich turned right around and caught this redfish which was about 24". He had eaten a pigfish that was 6" long and as the picture shows, this fish still had plenty of pigfish to get down.
By the end of the 4 hour trip, Dave and Rich had managed to catch 25 redfish and 4 trout, with Dave ending the trip with a 28 1/2" Red.
This gave him the bragging rights for the biggest redfish of the trip, and also, for the one having the most spots. I am sure Rich will not live that one down!!!..."What an unbelievable day!"
When I checked my E-Mail the next day, Rich wrote me saying thank you, and that Dave's arm was so sore from catching so many redfish that he had blistered Dave on the golf course the next day. Sorry I could not post all of the photos of the fish that we caught in this report, but if you visit my website there are three pages of pictures you can take a look at.
Thanks again guys!
Capt. Mike Pankey
Hanky Pankey Guide Service
Target Species:
redfish and trout
More Fishing Reports:
