Fishing Report for Pine Island Sound to Sarasota Bay, Florida

Capt. Butch Rickey
December 9, 2002
Pine Island Sound - Saltwater Fishing Report

REPORT FOR THE WEEK ENDING 12/7/2002 by Capt. Butch Rickey

Every guide I’m talking to lately has the same story. There’s no work. We’re feeling good to get in one or two trips a week, right now. Besides the obvious financial burden, it doesn’t leave me much to talk about. I’ll try to make it entertaining.

The first trip was on Sunday with my good friend Capt. George Halper, of Hawkeye Charters. He had booked a two boat trip through Outdoor Connection, and hired me as the second boat. I was happy to have the trip, even as I saw that the weather would likely be nasty as our date approached.

We had to pick up at South Seas Plantation. The plan was that I would stop at the Sanibel Causeway and hopefully get enough bait for the two of us to fish with. I was up and on the water before the sun came up. It was already raining. I headed to the causeway to do what I absolutely detest doing; catching bait at the bridge alone in the boat! It’s damned dangerous! I staged the boat at the third span where I had been getting bait, and could see it flicking everywhere. On the first throw I had what looked like enough for both George and me. I threw two more times, and just picked out the better shiners. I headed to South Seas and marker 2.

It was quarter till eight when George pulled up as I sat anchored with my PowerPole. He looked about as thrilled to be out there as I was. We were both already pretty wet. George headed on in to pick up our party, as I continued to eat a soggy sandwich. When he returned, he had seven fishermen! I knew George would have to take four, and felt sorry for him. That’s just way too many for our style of fishing. Hell, three anglers is too many! I had three, and was determined to make the best of a cold, wet, and overcrowded situation.

Since George had had one of the worst days of his guiding career the day before, we decided he would follow me, since our party wanted to try to fish together. Well, folks! This presents a whole new group of problems. Flats and backcountry fishing isn’t something you can typically successfully do with more than one boat. Seven lines in the water in the same whole would indeed make things complicated.

I took our party to a great snook hole that can survive two boats. Unfortunately, the snook weren’t about to eat. We gave it maybe a half hour, and I was ready to move on. The second stop was a great snook hole, but one I didn’t know if we could successfully fish two boats in. I think both George and I were surprised and delighted to find the hole was full of big ladyfish, and a few trout. Our seven anglers had a blast catching the high flying leapers. They didn’t want to leave, and it made the rain more bearable.

Eventually, though, my guys really mastered the ladyfish, and I sensed it was time to do something else. Jim, one of the brothers in my party, mentioned that he had been out with my old friend Capt. Rey Rodriguez the precious Friday, and had a great time catching several tailing redfish. I knew it was a long shot with the front now on top of us, and the wind blowing like hell from the north, but I figured I could find us a few redfish somewhere on the Buck Key flats. Problem is, it’s a large area consisting of several miles of beautiful turtlegrass flats and scattered oyster bars. The question was, where to begin?

I settled down on one of the deeper areas to the north. George came in on my right side. I began chumming with shiners, threadfins, and some chopped ladyfish from our previous stop. I put out three rigs with ladyfish steaks on them, and one with a shiner. After the long, wet ride across the Sound, and exaggerated by the 25 knot north wind, everyone was freezing to death! I had a feeling that if we could catch a few reds, the boys would be ready to go home, and that was fine by me.

Even though all the conditions were against us, a few fish ate. My guys managed to catch 3 nice reds, and missed two others. George and his crew caught one or two, and missed a couple, also. As I had anticipated, the boys were ready to toss in the towel, and so were George and I. God, we were miserable, and George and I still had a very long ride home in the cold rain.

Just to make things interesting, the strong wind and wind driven water on the stern of my 9 ft. wide Talon combined to sheer the stressed bolt on my PowerPole, and send me sailing toward some stuff I didn’t even want to encounter with my boat hull. I grabbed the pushpole and jammed it into one of my parties hands and told him to try to stop the boat while I desperately tried to get the anchor out and stop the boat with it. I know what you’re thinking! Why didn’t I just crank the motor? Well, the wonderful Yamaha that always starts in an instant didn’t want to start!!

After some tense moments we were anchored, and I managed to get the motor started. It was simply so cold, it needed to be choked. Once the motor was running, I tied off my disabled PowerPole to the poling platform for the ride home. We were off to deliver our frozen anglers back to South Seas!

On the long, wet ride home, I couldn’t help but smile and feel smug at how my Talon F-16 just danced it’s way across the three foot seas in front of me. Although I was soaking wet, not a drop of it came from the Sound. Somehow, being in such a fine vessel make those nasty, windy days so much more tolerable!

My one-time customer and long time friend Lew Joseph invited me and another old customer and mutual friend, Mike Henry, owner of Pipestone Fly-In Outposts, in Ontario, Canada, to join him for some tripletail fishing on Thursday. When I stepped out of the house Thursday morning, I knew it would be a tough day to try to sightfish tripletail. It was blowing!

We decided to give it a try, anyway, and headed out. Lew wanted to catch some bait, so we headed to the third span of the causeway. Since I thought we were only going to fish tripletail, and didn’t anticipate catching bait, I wore some ironed and starched duds that I usually wouldn’t wear fishing. Lew would throw the net!

At the causeway, I took the helm. Lew took the net on the bow. I eased him up to the bridge and he threw the net. What I didn’t know, and couldn’t tell from Lew’s body language, was that his net was hung on the bottom! We were in a brisk southeast wind, and a raging tide, moving probably 6 knots under the bridge. My heart nearly jumped out of my chest as I saw the rope pull tight on Lew’s wrist, and realized he was hung. The boat was sideways to the current, and I knew that if I gunned the engine, it would be the last we ever saw of Lew alive. Lew held on for dear life as the wind and current tried to pull him from the boat, as I tried to gently get the boat turned to the current using Lew and the anchor point. After what seemed like an eternity, the boat was turned, and I was able to give her some throttle to get the pull off Lew’s arm. Lew was understandably pale white and shaking. Thank God he was able to hang on! My instinct was to grab a fillet knife and cut him loose, but I didn’t’ know where to find one. Neither did Mike.

We finally got the boat over the net, and got it up, and to the credit of the West Coast net, it only had a couple of severed braille lines. I was just thanking God that we had averted what could have been an absolute tragedy. And, there you have, folks, why I won’t catch bait around the causeway by myself! It IS dangerous.

After we got our wits about us and made a few more throws with no success, I suggested we just go tripletail fishing, and to hell with bait. Everyone agreed. We headed up to and out of Redfish Pass, and began running crab pots. We must have run 300 pots without so much as seeing a fish. Mike had been telling tales of the snook he had been catching inside, and I suggested we go to his magic spot and catch some fish using lures. We all agreed.

It was a bad day to be fishing, and in the end I caught the only two fish caught; a specked trout and a snook. But, the fish caught didn’t matter. It had been a great day on the water with two old friends, and the near tragedy with Lew on the net drove home how precious good friends, and life, are! Be safe out there, folks!

More Fishing Reports:

• All Reports by Capt. Butch Rickey
• Pine Island Sound Fishing Reports
• Southwest Florida (Cape Sable to Boca Grande) Reports
• Florida Fishing Reports
• Browse All Fishing Reports