Hi Folks,
We hit the water in my little jonboat at about 6:45 and were on our way to the rock garden. There were a buch of ominous clouds over shell point but the wind was coming out of the east and the clouds stayed away all morning. It was overcast and the wind was moving us pretty good, but it never got too windy.
We started at the rock garden and let the wind push us up the coast and inshore and then moved back out, zigzagging from the rocks all the way back to the lighthouse in about 3-6 ft.
The trout were spread out and we never hit a really hot spot. Also, we didn't see anything other than trout and cat, which was odd because when I was out last week we had our share of ladies, a pompano, etc.
Based on your advice below, I tried a buch of different techniques, lures, etc. While we constantly lost a lot of live shrimp under CTs, and we did catch one big trout on a live pinfish - it's amazing how ambitious they are (the pinfish was 1/3 the length of the trout!) - they were not interested in anything fake. I caught one short trout on a red DOA. In addition to the DOAs (white and red) we tried chug bugs, mirros, and SWAs all to no avail.
On the very last drift (straight south of the lighthouse) I got a couple tentative hits on a black chug bug, but no good strikes.
We came home with three in the cooler, two caught on live shrimp under a CT the other on a live pinfish.
All in all a great day, considering I expected to be rained out before we put the boat in.
St. Marks 5/16/04
Moderators: bman, Chalk, Tom Keels
Dr. Jones,
Thanks for the report. I didn't fare a whole lot better Saturday. Left l.h. by 8:15 am went east past g.m. Water was beautiful, slightly overcast, light wind, everything but hungry fish! Sorta fished our way back towards l.h. then on to west flats all the way to stake line off Shell Pt.
Left the water at 3:30 pm - total 7 nice trout up to 19 in, 2 silver trout. No macks, ladies, cats, blues etc - just trout. Interesting compared to how it has been!! They were certainly scattered everywhere. One caught on a victimizer, one on live pin under ct and the rest on swa electric chicken.
Still it was a good day on the water - caught supper - no boat or motor troubles and made it home in time to watch Smarty!!
Sea Gurl
Thanks for the report. I didn't fare a whole lot better Saturday. Left l.h. by 8:15 am went east past g.m. Water was beautiful, slightly overcast, light wind, everything but hungry fish! Sorta fished our way back towards l.h. then on to west flats all the way to stake line off Shell Pt.
Left the water at 3:30 pm - total 7 nice trout up to 19 in, 2 silver trout. No macks, ladies, cats, blues etc - just trout. Interesting compared to how it has been!! They were certainly scattered everywhere. One caught on a victimizer, one on live pin under ct and the rest on swa electric chicken.
Still it was a good day on the water - caught supper - no boat or motor troubles and made it home in time to watch Smarty!!

Sea Gurl
- dstockwell
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- Location: Valdosta, GA