Hot fishing in Sarasota for a variety of species!
Capt. Jim Klopfer
February 20, 2016
Sarasota - Saltwater Fishing Report
The weather was fantastic this week, and the fishing wasn't far behind! The key to angling success this week was to get away from the dirty water near the passes. Normally, the passes and flats are very productive, but the wind had the Gulf stirred up. The flats north, Stephen's Pt in particular, and south in Robert's Bay provided steady to hot action for clients casting red/gold shiner Bass Assassin Sea Shad baits on a 1/4 ounce jig head. Most of the fish were hard fighting ladyfish with speckled trout, pompano, bluefish, and Spanish mackerel mixed in. Docks, ledges, and oyster bars in Big Pass and south produced sheepshead, gag grouper, mangrove snapper, redfish, snook and black drum for patient anglers fishing with live or fresh shrimp.
I started my week off on Sunday afternoon with Jay Lalley , his son Jim and daughter-in-law Anne. We stayed in Robert's Bay, catching a bunch of ladyfish on jigs then hitting some docks and landing some sheepshead on live shrimp.
Andy Lehman from Michigan experienced very good action on ladyfish with a couple of speckled trout mixed in at Stephen's Pt. Glow and New Penny Bass Assassin jigs were used. We moved to fish some Bird Key docks and caught mangrove snapper to 14", gag grouper, and butterfish on live shrimp. Tuesday was a boat maintenance day.
My client on Wednesday was Kevin Jeffrey from New York. We started off at Stephen's Pt with hot action on ladyfish. Kevin caught 17 fish on his first 20 casts, and had bites on the other three! After landing forty or so total, we changed gears and hit some ledges and docks near Big Pass, landing sheepshead, snapper, and gag grouper using shrimp fished on the bottom.
I picked up Ed Buck and his friend Sandy Unger at Ken Thompson Island on Thursday. We headed south and for the first part of the trip caught ladyfish on jigs in Robert's Bay. We then had great success at a dock, catching a half dozen nice sheepshead and a couple of redfish, one of which was 25". We finished up in a canal, landing a couple more sheepies and a black drum.
Mark Kolb and Dale Nixon, friends from Wisconsin, booked a 6 hour charter on Friday. We started off casting Bass Assassin jigs at the Middlegrounds, catching a few bluefish and ladyfish. The wind picked up and we ran to Stephen's Pt, to once again find very good action on ladyfish with a few speckled trout mixed in. Dale switched to a shrimp under a popping cork and fooled a nice 3 lb Spanish mackerel and a decent pompano. We ran south and caught a few sheepshead fishing shrimp under docks and several more ladyfish on jigs in Robert's Bay.
I finished up my busy week with long-time client Bill Thiel from Naperville, IL and his friends Gary and Fred. WE started off working oyster bars and docks north of Stickney Pt., catching several redfish to 19", a snook, and a dozen sheepshead to 4 pounds. We topped off the charter with a little ladyfish blitz in Robert's Bay.
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