Keaton Beach Yesterday

[Capt Reggie]

My son, The Turtle, woke up feeling the "party hardy", so we were late to the hook-up with Reel Cowboy + Bride @ 7:30! Sorry, guys. About 9:30, we launched and head out, finally - Turtle Tommy much better now!

Fished the flats over by the island = 4-6'; water clear (temp 67-68 degrees), lots of "short trout" on Gold/Red Uzuri (fished jerk-bait style, down under), Red/White Mirrolure (down under), Bass Assassins/Gulp in Gold/Red & Gold/Silver flash with jigs down under; Tommy killing me using live shrimp on CT - one keeper trout. Macks moved in & cut me off (lost Red/Gold Uzuri $7.99 lure - ); tied on Slurp baits with jig in Candy Corn color & started catching Macks, Ladies, big Blue's down under drifting with the wind until noontime.

Wind increased ESE 15 MPH & switched around WSW 10-15 MPH in afternoon. Trolled small silver spoons w 1&1/2 oz. keel weights around 1,000-1,200 rpm (GPS = 3.5-4.5 mph) to catch nice macks around edge of flats over to Dekle Beach area. Fished flats on drift from "Bird Roast" into shore = caught lots of small trout & lady fish on Slurp Banana color, & Assassin Arkansas (sic) Shiner color with heavy jig, drifting behind boat using small hops in the grass; also, TT28, Red/White, & Orange/Yellow color Mirrorlures fished slow lee side of boat.

When Turtle Tommy ran out of shrimp he went to using Exude Shrimp & Jig behind CT - caught small trout & Ladyfish - cut off by nice Bluefish! Several Mack attacks cut off, too! Water temp 70 degrees, wind increasing to 15-20 mph SWS! Left the fish hungry @ 5 pm!
Great day on the water...sorry I never made contact with RC & Bride! Next time, we pick a radio channel (forget the cell phone - no work down there)!

[birddog]

Good trip Capt.

[beatswork]

I have some silver spoons and heard of people trolling them for macks but never have myself. Normally I just sling and retrieve. How is this done successfully as far as rigging? Will I need to add any weight in front of the spoon? Do you normally use wire to prevent being cutoff? Thanks for any help.

[Nathan]

40# mono leader. Clarke spoons work well trolling. Rig them up with a small feather duster or king duster about 3' in front of the spoon. Depending on how deep and how fast you want to fish you probably need a trolling weight about 8-10' in front of all of this. 1 or 2 oz. is probably sufficient for trolling the flats. One thing I do is put a hook on everything in the water. Of course the spoon already has a hook on it, but put one on the duster and on the weight. Scrape the weight with an old knife or something to make it shiny and you'll catch a bunch of fish on it.

Nathan

[beatswork]

Good information, I'll give it a try. Thanks.

[Capt Reggie]

I probably do things a little differently: I start off trolling two spoons, size #1-3, one spoon larger and a different color than the other - either Clark or a wider one (I forget the brand name ), with the larger spoon having a heavier weight on it. As such: Small spoon = 1&1/2 oz. keel weight; larger spoon = 2&3/4 oz. keel weight. Troll in at least six feet of water for this technique (in water shallower than 5 feet, take the weights off). Usually, the mackeral will take one of the spoons! Also, in order to catch bigger fish or King Mackeral I use a much larger spoon, dusters, and weights in 10+ feet of water. Trolling speed is probably around 1,000-1,200 rpm or 3.5 - 5 mph! That is a slow start, anyway, either methods will catch fish, and if they don't work, try slow trolling a live blue runner, pinfish, mullet.

By the way, I am an advocate for using wire leader - the smallest I can get by with. Otherwise, 50-80# mono leaders catch more macks, but you get cut off by the huge fish - sorry!

[reel therapy]

Sounds like a good day.