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Daniel a fishing buddy of mine got the fever for a boat of his own. I helped him find one(a bradford 14' stick steer without a motor) and he found a 80's model 50hp evinrude for it. He said he wanted to take it for a shakedown cruise sat but the weather did not look good. He said unless it was smallcraft advisory that he wanted to go fishing. I was kind of cool to get picked up to go fishing and not have to deal with all the preparations. We got on the water at 7:00 and headed over to the creeks around hickory mound. Using the trolling moter we fished way back up in there for 2 hours and no strikes or anything. So we decided to brave the whitecaps and get out on the flats. Not much happening till this baby showed up. Man what a fight! I thought I had a cobia the way it took drag. And the fact that I caught it on a pinfish. This was a beautiful upper slot red at 8lbs, the 1st I have ever landed. The wind at 15knots never let up and we took on water whenever we moved because of the crosswind. And the 3' rollers bout shook our teeth out. The water temp was 84-86 degrees and sloppy. We never could really get on the fish or get away from the cats and sharks. We wound up with the red, 4 trout (18-20.5") and 3 large seabass. Not a bad day considering the weather. And nothing broke and we made it back. But I think with the Bradford we need to pick better days. But now we know it's limits.

Congratulation on the first Red. Wish you many more to come. Still, a good day's fishing in a small boat on rough seas. Thanks for the report.

Congrats on the Red!

Looks like a good day to me
FF

Congrats, nice red. WTG in all that rough water!

Congrats! It was a tough weather day for sure!

Thanks It's been 30 years of fishing coming. I saw an avalanche at the ramp with Rhtfish on the front. I did not know it was ok to park where it was. How good did you all do.

Congrats on that Red !!!!!!!!

Congrats on the Red fish. I hope you have many more great days on the water with your new boat.

Congrats on the red! I was out at Econfina Saturday too, in the crummy weather, but had no such luck. The other guys I was with only managed 3 keeper trout, and kept catching the cats. I caught nothing the whole day. I was hoping to blame the whole day on the weather, but after seeing your pics I don't think I can use that excuse!

Way to go, HnM. Nice red.

Hit-n-Miss wrote: Thanks It's been 30 years of fishing coming. I saw an avalanche at the ramp with Rhtfish on the front. I did not know it was ok to park where it was. How good did you all do.

That spot is reserved for me!

Seriously, got to get there early to get that spot!

I went out at 0dark30 in STRIKE TWO and tried to run some creeks but the wind was unreal! I took the backcountry route to the east for awhile with
no results to report except the motor got a good workout. It just loves all that floating grass!

aeiou1 wrote:Congrats on the red! I was out at Econfina Saturday too, in the crummy weather, but had no such luck. The other guys I was with only managed 3 keeper trout, and kept catching the cats. I caught nothing the whole day. I was hoping to blame the whole day on the weather, but after seeing your pics I don't think I can use that excuse!

Thanks. Did you use any live pinfish? We stayed until 2:30 to get what we did.

Congrats, Hit-N-Miss! Life's never the same after that first Econ redfish... you too will now suffer from a malady called "Econfina Fever" for the rest of your life!

Hit-n-Miss wrote:Thanks. Did you use any live pinfish? We stayed until 2:30 to get what we did.

You know I was kicking myself because I didn't. I was throwing gold spoons, new penny and pearl white gulps, using the cajun thunder at times, but never did the live pinfish. I even bought sabiki lures the night before after reading about some successes the guys on the site have had, and promptly left them at home when we went fishing! I will surely try them next time though!