Keaton Beach Report
Posted: April 14th, 2007, 1:21 pm
GoodMorning everyone. I hope most are out on the big pond catching in on these hot bites! My report is from yesterday out of the public landing @ Keaton Beach. Water temp 66-68, morning through the afternoon;
air temp 55 morning - 75 degrees afternoon;
wind ESE 8:30 a.m. - 11:45, 15-20 mph; shift W noonish @ 5-10 mph: shift WSW @ 15 mph 1:30 - 5:30 p.m.;
clear skies, no clouds;
extreme low tide early AM - high around 12:30 - falling good @ 1:30 down to a low again around 5:30 p.m.;
water very clear in shallows 2-4 feet, becoming slightly stained (with the incoming tide flow) around 5-7 feet.
Caught trout early (9am-10:30 am):
1. Used floating Mirrolures - Red/White, Red/Yellow, Gold/Green; Yozuri - Brown-back/Yellow sides, Gold/Red & Metal Flake. Use floating series in an underwater jerk bait motion (jerk 2-3X, pause 2-seconds). They busted it most often on the pause!
2. 1/4-1/2 oz. pink or chartruse color Jigheads & Red/Silver Zooms, Pink/White & Natural color DOA Shrimp (behind Cajun Thunder), Red/Gold & metal flake Saltwater Assasins, White curly-tailed & New Penny Gulps, and Red/Gold Shiner Exudes. Fish slow through the grass pockets (around sand or "clam" holes), hop it along - sometimes "dead stick" it!
3. Popping Cork & Cajun Thunder rigs, 4-6 foot, 30-40# test leaders, Owner bait hooks, 2/0-3/0, using live shrimp!
At 10:30 a.m. the Bluefish & Spanish Mackeral moved in, the trout moved (somewhere else - can you blame them?), and we changed to small black wire leaders or 50-60 # test shock leaders (after several cut offs
). But, you have to love those chopper boys because they sure put up a great fight and really screech your drag! 
At noontime we began trolling small silver # 2 spoons with 1&3/4 oz. keel weights @ 900-1,000 rpm outside the grass flats! Spanish & Blues continued the bite until the wind shift around 1:30 p.m.
From 1:30 - 5:30 p.m. when we put the Miss Courtney on the trailer, we fished close to the channel markers and continued catching blues. We left them biting...too tired to catch any more!
Thank the Lord for a good day upon the water. My friend Gene is feeling better and I finally got the boat out of the wet slip!
