Federal Point shrimp report (near Palatka). Aug 11 06

[Big Bend Brian]

In one of our last summer adventures before school starts, I took the kids shrimping out of Green Cove Springs at the Governors Park ramp. At 11 a.m. it was pretty windy out of the northwest with the wind picking up. In the deeper part of the river whitecaps were everywhere. We tried to get out of the wind but couldn’t. Anchoring wasn’t working so I threw the net a couple of times in 21 feet while we drifted and each throw managed 10 medium to large river crickets. Since we couldn’t anchor in the desired zone we retuned back to the dock and headed further south hopefully finding somewhere out of the wind.

Shrimping near the Federal Point area around 1300 hrs we stayed on the west side of the river to avoid the wind. We managed 3 gallons of mostly medium river crickets (3 species) throwing a 10 foot net for about 4 hours. Our best depth was ~ 18 feet. It was a bright clear day with just a few clouds. Low & high tide was at 1152 (-0.3 ft) and 1726 hrs (91.2 ft), respectively.

The kids did well despite a few disagreements over whose turn it was to release all the bullheads, shad, croakers, soles, flounder (small), & trout that we netted. We averaged ~ 20 shrimp per throw with the highest of 56 (kids counted). The shrimp however were definitely larger further down river. As a side bonus of shrimping, the kids truly enjoyed the fish diversity we were netting. Casey picked shrimp the entire time while his younger sister helped out for most of the time but later resorted to coloring in her coloring book. Once the hot boiled peanuts, skittles, and other goodies were gone we called it an excellent day and headed home.


Casey in training (Green Cove Springs)


This spot is now affectionately named Toes.

Brian

[Redbelly]

Looks like a worthwhile trip to me!!