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Tampa Bay - South Shore
Capt. Fred Everson
October 21, 2006
Tampa Bay - Saltwater Fishing Report
Water clarity continues to improve as the temperature drops, and the snook bite finally picked up. Keli Emery said she caught seven snook in the Little Manatee River on live sardines. She caught bait on the flats near Simmons Park, and said that it was all good sized. All her snook came at the end of a long day of fishing.
Redfish have done the disappearing act again from the flats south of Apollo Beach. I don’t know where they go, but the last two times I was there all I saw were stingrays and catfish. I caught one single short snook, and never saw another one. These flats used to be alive with snook, but the numbers just haven’t been there the past few seasons.
Spanish mackerel continue their rampage on the surface of the bay all the way up to Apollo Beach. Capt. Larry Malinoski said his clients caught them on practically every cast for the better part of the afternoon one day last week. The mackerel were mixed in with schools of ladyfish, and hit shiny metal lures.
I also saw numerous schools of big jack crevalles around the mouth of the Little Manatee River one evening last week while looking for pompano. I skipped one fish in the river, but didn’t see any others.
A big school of jacks crashed the seawall west of the marina as I was doing some rod repairs behind the house and I grabbed a rod from the garage and pitched a lure into the melee. I hooked one on a pompano jig and promptly got broke off on when the fish ran under a dock. These were very big jacks and they thrashed the water to froth for about 5 minutes.
The grouper bite in the bay continues to be a best bet. Anglers are catching the fish on number two planers rigged with four and six ounce jigs, running twenty-five feet of 60-pound monofilament behind the planer. Also effective are deep diving plugs fished on 50-pound microfilament. Grouper pros use the fine diameter line when they want to take the plugs to maximum depth. When they want them to run higher in the water column, they use monofilament. Last time out, the red and white plug caught all the fish.
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