East of St Marks- May 30th

[onefishtwofish]

We fished the RT shootout today. Great day to be on the water.

In the last 10 days we had caught at least one red over 6 pounds in 3 different spots, so we felt like our prefishing was done for the reds.

We concentrated on trout in the am and let the tide rise for our holes. We did very well on trout - if it was a slot tournament. Caught 7 keeper trout, only one over 20" and it was 22". 2.3 pounds. We had 4 more just shy of 20, would have made a nice slot bag. Caught on top, suspending and jig with a color we had not caught any in a while (super secret).

Of course, we pounded the rats, caught 5 flounder. No love from any nice reds. Had one 21" late morning and no love from any of our "sure thing" spots.
Finally managed a good pulling red. After a very respectable fight, we pulled over a 3.5 pounder at about 3:00. Bright side, we did not have to rush to weigh in. Had a great day just fishing, crappy day for tourney! Oh well, it be that way sometimes.

We felt like the good news was that some trout were showing up and the ones we caught were aggressive and chunky.

Oh yeah, the super secret color was red with gold flecks.

[tallykenj]

Nice!

[2true]

Good job you did a great deal better than we did ...

[SS-342]

"Oh yeah, the super secret color was red with gold flecks."

I got some too but never caught a fish with the ones we have. Got to give it a try next time….THANKS. Thought you might say "Disco". That was our SECRET WEAPON last Thursday.

A good report…thanks again!

[Hit-n-Miss]

Great report. What's the water like clearing up? Notice any scallops?

[milto]

We fished the RT as well, but didn't have as much luck as onefish2fish had. We did have the same luck with the reds... the rat reds that is. We actually didn't have the first top water blow up until about 2:30 which was our first trout of the day. We did see several nice reds but by that time the current was pushing us over them and spooking them.

Great report. What's the water like clearing up? Notice any scallops?

The water from Aucilla towards St. Marks was definitely more clear than it has been. Still stained but not dark. Had no problem seeing the bottom in 3-4. Not sure about the scallops tho. Should have maybe worked those areas on the flats but we mostly stayed in the creeks hoping for the bigger fish.

[onefishtwofish]

Water was definitely clearer, but still a bit dark. We did see some grassy bottom, which was nice.

I forgot to add about 10:30 or so I thought I had a nice red on. It was on a suspending and a hard hit and I could not move him with the baitcaster. We were in about 3 feet of water and he stayed right on the bottom and made some pretty decent little runs. We were pretty pumped until he tired and I got him up and we saw a foul hooked rat! Was a fun fight. He was hooked right back by the gill plate and would not have been legal to keep even if he had been large enough. Kinda glad he was a short, that would have been a heartache to catch a nice one like that.

[Hit-n-Miss]

Good to hear that the water is clearing up. I hope that the scallops are there this year. It's closer than Keaton and you have more options for fishing.(deep water is closer, flats or even swim the springs up the Wakulla river if the fish aren't biting)