Fishing Report for Pine Island Sound to Sarasota Bay, Florida

Capt. Butch Rickey
September 26, 2004
Pine Island Sound - Saltwater Fishing Report

REPORT FOR THE WEEK ENDING 9/25/04 by Capt. Butch Rickey

This was the first time I've gotten to run trips since Charley came through here and rearranged the landscape. It was just great to be back on the water, and the fishing was nothing short of fabulous. During the break I took the Talon up to the factory in Sarasota to have three years of fishing dings, scratches, and a spider in the gelcoat removed. It's the kind of thing that takes time to do, and there's never time for things like that when we're working. The folks at Talon were fabulous, and took care of everything on my list, and covered most of it under warranty. They even completely cleaned the boat deck, bilge, and hull, and polished the hull to boot. It looks almost like a brand new boat, again. I also had a new cushion made for the baitwell seat, as the old one was getting pretty tired, and wouldn't hold the lid open, anymore. I can't tell you how good it felt to put her in the water and feel her scoot along beneath me.

After many canceled trips, it was finally time to work, again. The weather right before my Wednesday trip was not good, so I didn't have the opportunity to get out and pre-fish. It was almost the same feeling every guide has when he's first starting out, and is feeling very unsure of himself. I was afraid I would have to be retrained. I also gave Dan and Mont a couple of caveats, in that we had a 13 hour falling tide, and a serious east wind gusting to around 30 MPH. I figured those two conditions alone would be enough to shut down the fishing. I was mentally ready for a very tough day.

My customer for Wednesday was Dan Harper, of Hoopeston, Illinois, and his friend Monty. Dan had told me after Charley that he wasn't about to cancel his vacation, and was ready to fish. We met at the ramp at 7 AM, and after getting their supplies loaded were off to begin the hunt for bait at Picnic Island. It's hard to look at that very popular key and see how different it looks now. We didn't get any shiners longer than 2 inches, but got a great variety of pinfish from tiny to large enough to fillet. I figured that if there weren't many/any shiners around, the fish would probably eat pinfish just as well, anyway. As it turned out, I was right.

We headed to a spot on the east side of the Sound that usually holds redfish, hoping to get a few to eat before the water started falling out too hard. We worked four lines, two with cut bait and two with live pinfish under floats, and never had a hit. I was beginning to think my gut feeling was right!

We headed to the next stop; another place that usually has redfish. After making my approach into the area, I pitched the first bait, a live pin under a float. As it hit the water I turned to hand the rod to Dan, and it was nearly jerked right out of my hands. Fish on!

And, that was the start of it. For the next several hours we caught redfish after redfish with a few snook mixed in for good luck. The first 10 fish, or so, were all caught on live bait, getting eaten as soon as it hit the water. For some reason they quit eating that, and I quickly switched to cut pinfish, and the bite was back on. By the time the tide was low enough to shut down the bite, we had landed at least two dozen redfish, and probably closer to 30, and 5 snook. The snook were all caught on cut pinfish.

Dan, Mont, and I had a blast! The fish were strong and beautiful, with a deep bronze color from the dark tannin stained water. And we caught two reds that would have been money fish in a tournament. One had 10 spots, and the other had 8, as I recall. It had been a rough, windy day, but well worth it. We finished our great day at the Waterfront Restaurant. It's always the perfect way to end a day of fishing.

On Friday, it was my old friend Dr. Jack Crozier, and his good friend Dr. Matt DiAndreth, of Beaver, Pennsylvania. Neither of us realized we hadn't fished together in three years, as Jack had not been in the Talon. I knew he'd love the boat. I hoped we could duplicate Wednesday's action for him and Matt.

We headed back to Picnic for bait, and had no problem getting plenty of pinfish, but still there were only tiny little shiners probably not worth fooling around with. I also stopped at what we call the Engineer's House, at St. James Creek, but to no avail. Pinfish only. I didn't want to waste any more time with bait, as there were more boats at the ramp this morning than I had seen since July.

I headed back to the scene of Wednesday's action. As I approached the area, I could see there was another boat sitting on my spot, but I was pretty sure it was my friend Capt. Paul Hobby. I had told him about the fish when he had called me Wednesday night. By the time we got into the flat Paul said he had just caught the first fish. We anchored on his port side about 100 feet off, and couldn't raise a fish. We moved around to his starboard side and put out live and chunk baits, and still couldn't raise a fish. Paul had caught three or four.

For some reason, Paul didn't hang around. I think he said they were scouting for a tournament the next day. Once they left, we moved up to the piece of very fertile redfish grounds, and did our thing. The fish just wouldn't leave the cover they were holding on. I gave them a little chum, and put our baits out, and for the next several hours it was pandemonium. Redfish after redfish ate our baits, both kinds. But only if the baits were place right next to the edge of the cover. Once the bite finally slowed we were pushing a 50 fish total really hard. We only needed a few more fish to break the 50 mark. We hit several more spots catching one or two fish as we went, and then at the last spot we had a short, but good bite. We stopped and headed to the Waterfront Restaurant with a total of 49 redfish, and one snook! What a day! Jack has been with me on days like that in the past, but this was a first time experience for Matt, and I think he really had a ball.

Back at the ramp, Matt wanted some instruction on how to fillet the reds. I showed him on two fish, and let him try on the last one. His first observation was that I made it look very easy. Well, I filleted a zillion of them. But, Matt did OK for his first attempt. A little practice will go a long way.

Well, here we are, looking down the barrel at yet another hurricane threat. Her name is Jeanne. AS of this time, Saturday afternoon, she's headed straight at us via the east coast. She's supposed to turn northward, but no matter what she does now, we will get at least tropical storm force winds. If she doesn't turn, we're in for another exciting, perhaps devastating weekend. I ask all my friends around the country to pray for us down here in Florida tonight.

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