Econfina 10-19-03

Post by **dolphinatic** » October 20th, 2003, 12:47 am

Got to the boat ramp about 7:00 in the am. We were about number 10 or so in line. Apparently, the fish were rumored to be biting. We finally got in the water about 7:25 and were on our way. High tide was at 6:33. We headed out towards the bird racks and started out first drift about 1/2 way out due east. We drifted out towards the racks and fished back towards land. The wind was blowing quite nicely out of the SE. We immediately started catching trout and had 4 keepers in boat in the first 20 -25 minutes. Threw back 4 -5 shorts within 1/2 " of the slot. The wind picked up a bit, so we headed back in about 1/4 mile or so. It took a little bit longer, but after about 30 minutes, the bite was on. We boated 6 more keepers and a huge sailcat (it took about 5 minutes to boat the cat). We eventually headed west back towards Aucilla to make one final drift. We caught 3 more keepers, a bunch of shorts (between 13 1/2 - 14 3/4 "...that hurts) and a few rock bass. We even lost a few nice ones right at the boat. The really big ones seem to know how to "throw the bait." We decided to head in around 2:30 or so to try to beat the low low tide. Anyone who has ever come in on a low tide at Econfina definatley can relate to this! TOTAL FOR THE DAY: 13 keeper trout (15 - 19 1/2"), 1 huge sailcat (about a 5-6 lb'er), couple of small rock bass.
Most of the trout were caught off SWA's (electric chicken, space guppy) fished under a Equalizer. The sailcat hit a "chicken." Caught a few trout off live shrimp on a jig head fished along the bottom. It was a beautiful day on the water and the past 2 weeks have been "speck"-tacular.

Post by **Chalk** » October 20th, 2003, 5:50 am

WTG...

Post by **tin can** » October 20th, 2003, 5:51 am

Sounds like a good day.

dstockwell · Post by **dstockwell** » October 20th, 2003, 6:44 am

nice..

Post by **CSMarine** » October 20th, 2003, 7:29 am

Sounds like a fine day on the water. Way to go.

Post by **wevans** » October 20th, 2003, 7:30 am

Nice catch

Post by **Sir reel** » October 20th, 2003, 8:32 am

Good report dolphinatic,

Would I be correct in saying that most of your success came 1 or 2 miles North of the platforms?

creech · Post by **creech** » October 20th, 2003, 9:27 am

Sounds like a good day on the water! What depth of water would you say that most of the fish were caught in? How far under the CT are your jigs?

Post by **dolphinatic** » October 20th, 2003, 5:39 pm

I'm having most of my luck about a mile in from the bird racks. I've been having the best luck in 4-5 ft. of water. Anything over 5 ft. has been real slow.

I have been using a 30" leader under an Equalizer with an SWA red jig head. I only used one head all day this past Saturday and never even had to change leaders. Caught about 20 fish off this setup. Although, by the end of the day, the leader was quite frayed. Also, the best action has come off retrieving the SWA as opposed to just letting it sit with the occasional "tap." Hope that helps......