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Myself and the boys decided since the forecast was 5 kts 1 foot or less we would make a long run to a couple of AJ #s to at least attempt to put some meat in the box since gag season is closed. The crew for today was myself, dad, don, jim, and chris. We pushed away from she'll island fish camp at 730 Am into the pea soup in search of bait. After a 45 minute bait stop we had about 40 pins/pigs and were ready for business. Punched in the # and were headed south. Only problem was the visibility was about 200 feet. We had to slowly plug along at 20 mph barely staying on plane following a saved track the whole way out. It would have been a rather chilly ride but dads relatively new curtains surrounding the cockpit pulled the save. Once at the sea buoy we knew we wernt going 40 miles to the AJ hole :/. Damn weather people must be smokn some of that legalized Washington weed...it was blowing 15 knots outta the ESE with 2-4 footers stacked about 4 seconds apart. We went to plan B...Sea Bass. We hit a few shallow #s with limited success. Finally we said the he!! with it and pushed through the 3-4 foot swells 5 miles further south to the go to Sea Bass #. After about 30 minutes we had 15 nice sea bass and 15 grunts and lost a nice bull red. At this point it was about 1230 and we were out of sea bass spots. I turned to the crew and said we needed to find something to feed all this live bait too since we weren't gonna make it to the AJ grounds today. Don looked at us and replied, y'all really want to see a grown man cry, lmao!! And we were off to the gag honey hole we slayed em on 6 weeks ago. We knew they were outta season but still a ball to catch in shallow water. Upon arrival it was the same song and dance. First bait down into 23 foot gets smashed and after quite the tug-o-war I bring in a stud of a gag going a touch over 15 pounds! Over the next 30 minutes we land 7 more quality gags between 25-30"!!! After releasing the 5th or 6th one I think I saw a couple tears roll down dons eyes from behind those costas. Even pops was sick over it! We ended up throwing back 16 big fillets at 19.99 a pound at publix After we were done playing with the gags we broke out the light rods again and we boxed another 15 quality sea bass and 25 more grunts for the crab traps. Don ended up catching our 8th woulda been keeper gag on his light spinning reel..25" gag All in all we had another he!! of a day but wish we coulda got to play with the reef donkeys -Tight Lines
Final Tally:
8 keeper Gags to 15 pounds
30 Keeper Sea bass to 15"
55 grunts for the Stone Crab Traps
Lost a nice Bull Red

Me and the 15 pound stud

Again

Don with a nice 27" Gag

Jim with a solid 25" brute

Don with his 25" Gag caught on a Redfish rod

A little Rum-N-Coke and fire to cap off the day....

Those were 2' seas.

Either way they screwed the pooch on the forecast. Our plan was the same and turned around 15 miles out in a bay boat to do inshore the rest of the day. It was cloudy, cold and wet the entire day.

Very nice guys.

Mastercaster: it was legit 3 footers where we were fishn...and it got worse as the morning went on.....either way they blew it!

Maybe a stupid question but, if Grouper is closed where does Publix get there's?

The wife and I went to Cedar Key sat when we got there the wind was at least 15 and there was white caps at the outside ramp. We never unloded the boat turned around and went to the waccassa river instead, thinking that we would just fish the creeks, didn't do much inside right away went to the mouth of the river, the flats were as flat as they could be the water temp has come up 8 degrees in two weeks. I guess the weather man just wanted to play a trick on everone

those costas are hiding all those Tears. Mexico and South America is usually source for out of season fish.
JH, maybe next trip for the donkeys. thanks again for the letting me cry in my beer

Don- it would be nice to to get after some reef donkeys. I talked to a buddy today at work that killed em on our oyster bar Sunday so it must be all about timing...they havnt gone anywhere

We were at the AJ hole saturday 2 footers. no ajs bit caught grouper and snapper they went back. Did not stay there all day. Looking for red grouper! Great report!!!! Sorry about the gags going back but looked like fun!!!!

CB: It was a blast but it was painful throwing back those keepers. Maybe I was off by a foot but when you can only run 14 miles an hour to prevent beating the $hit out of the boat and your crew (3+ hour run one way) whose ages were two guys in their mid 20s but 3 guys in their late 50s early 60s who wernt gonna put up with that crap in a smaller cuddy cabin....not 40 miles out!!....maybe one day Ill be rich and famouse and have a monster 33' yellowfin or contender and have no problem getting their comfortably and quickly

Another great report J! sucks having to throw those great filets back! My experience with Publix is they are RED grouper filets not gag, but if they are gag Greenbone probably nailed it on the further south fisheries