Monthly Archives: April 2015

April 1 through April 12, 2015

The month of April has started off with fantastic redfishing. So far this month I have been fishing the same 3 flats every day. There has been plenty of fish so I have seen no reason to change up and go looking. I’ve been working two different size class schools of fish. Some of the schools are in the 24-25” class and some are in the 28-31” class.

On the spin tackle (bait) charters, we have been staking out and making long casts to these fish and just letting the fish come find the bait. On the shallow water flats – it’s the only way to do it. Constant casting only spooks the fish. On my fly fishing trips I have been fishing the same fish, but we are poling these areas very quietly and spotting and casting to the fish before they figure out we are there.

I have heard good reports that the trout fishing has really picked up in the last couple of weeks. But when the redfish bite is as good as it has been – it’s really hard for me to go trout fishing.

Summer seems to be coming early this year with water temps already in the mid 70’s. The river is as full of bait as it is in mid summer. The tarpon are already showing up in good numbers, along with the Jack Crevalle, sharks and manatee

Jan – March 2015

The first three months of the year overall have been great fishing. We have had a few challenging days when the cold fronts have pushed through and the wind blew hard out of the north.

When the weather has been stable the redfish schools have been very predictable and hungry on the flats. These school fish have been running between 25 and 35 inch fish. This is absolutely my favorite way to fish. Schools of fish in shallow water that you can see before you get a bite whether you’re throwing live bait, artificials or flies.

On the higher water – the deeper spots along the Intracoastal, and in the back country, the creeks have been holding quite a few redfish also with a lot of smaller fish in the 17 inch range, but all the way up to 33 inch fish as well. These back country creeks have made the day many times when the wind was really blowing too hard to fish shallow water flats. Usually through the winter months these back country spots also hold a lot of black drum. But this year they haven’t showed up in big numbers like they usually do. We have caught a few but not the normal.

The speckled trout bite has been pretty slow through the latter part of winter, but have started showing up in pretty good numbers the last week. I expect the next month of April to be really good fishing with the redfish continuing to be on fire, the speckled trout and black drum bite also taking off with more stable weather. […]