Aucilla River May 5, 2007
Posted: May 5th, 2007, 8:27 pm
First Saturday I've been fishing in over a year. Got to Aucilla ramp about 7:30 and found about 25 trucks at the landing. Water was high enough to launch...so away we (3) went....down the river and out on the flats...toward Econfina. We had 3 keeper reds within 20 minutes of arriving on our red hole...and 3 puppies. Then they quit.
Time to hunt the alusive speckled trout anyway. Tide was still going out...so we began our drift toward the ocean. Wasn't long before we had about a 17-18 in trout in the boat. Went on this way for the next few hours....and we had 6 trout in the boat....mostly on Gulps....white and new penny....streight lining. The few bites we had on c/t with pins were small sharks...and they mostly didn't take the whole pin....just the lower half.
This fizzeled out so we headed west toward the rock garden. This was our ticket. First cast resulted in a close 3 pound trout....white gulp. Kept this up off and on for the next 4 hours....never could get a lot of bites everywhere...but here and there....some gooduns.
High lite of the day was the tarpon that hit Dixie Rebs c/t with a pinfish. He had a new rig....just for bigguns....20 lb line....30 lb leader. Before we could get the boat after him....the fish spooled Reb down to the tie-on....and broke the line. The fish jumped at least one time....and 3 boats saw about a 75-100 pound tarpon....headed toward the Lt House.....free as you please.
We wound up with our limit of trout and reds, plus two drum that would probably have gone 4-5 lbs each. A truly memorial day on the flats.
Water temp was close to 78 degrees...and color was just right.
Time to hunt the alusive speckled trout anyway. Tide was still going out...so we began our drift toward the ocean. Wasn't long before we had about a 17-18 in trout in the boat. Went on this way for the next few hours....and we had 6 trout in the boat....mostly on Gulps....white and new penny....streight lining. The few bites we had on c/t with pins were small sharks...and they mostly didn't take the whole pin....just the lower half.
This fizzeled out so we headed west toward the rock garden. This was our ticket. First cast resulted in a close 3 pound trout....white gulp. Kept this up off and on for the next 4 hours....never could get a lot of bites everywhere...but here and there....some gooduns.
High lite of the day was the tarpon that hit Dixie Rebs c/t with a pinfish. He had a new rig....just for bigguns....20 lb line....30 lb leader. Before we could get the boat after him....the fish spooled Reb down to the tie-on....and broke the line. The fish jumped at least one time....and 3 boats saw about a 75-100 pound tarpon....headed toward the Lt House.....free as you please.
We wound up with our limit of trout and reds, plus two drum that would probably have gone 4-5 lbs each. A truly memorial day on the flats.
Water temp was close to 78 degrees...and color was just right.
I tell ya, as bad as I hate to lose a big fish, there was no stopping that "train" I had on the line. A buddy boat saw my CT float up and got it back for me, still had all the 100 ft. of line attached. 
That's the first tarpon hookup I ever got. It was something else!! We had fun with the 3 reds and 2 drums we got, too. 
Tarpon, and a hookup, neat. Glad you got all that line back.
