Steinhatchee 06/06/15

[zload]

A little late reporting but the Admiral wanted to go boating and fish some this past weekend. Tides/moon a bit off but I go when she says she wants to go since it is more about relaxation than eating fish.

Thunderstorms on the coast early so we waited until they cleared before committing to the drive down.

Got down around lunch time with high tide at around 4ish, a pretty good storm was hanging right around Pepperfish so eased out of the channel with the Garmin weather module turned on and watching for storm movement. Right at the last channel marker saw tons of bait churning around some weeds that had piled up but not a lot of fish or bird activity, tossed some jigs and spoons into the mix but no takers, I'm thinking there were some macs around.

Storm was still hanging right over the coast South so ran out to one of the sandbanks with a deeper channel around it and usually nice grass beds, water was sparkling clear, grass seemed to be thick and healthy off the bank tossed gulp shrimp and jerk baits, caught a couple of short trout and one hefty jack. Headed back South once the storm cleared out preparing to follow the tide in and try for some reds, or as my wife said she was trying to catch one of those CCA Star boats.

Water was really clear in the 4' and shallower range but a lot of floating grass, the grass seemed to be starting to really grow about like I would expect in late March. Didn't see much bait and only a few pinfish pecks on the Gulp shrimp. Thought I was going to have to relocate as an airboat came down the grass line and stopped about where I had planned on fishing as I was about 100 yards from the grass but he moved off quickly so I continued in on the TM. I've caught multiple short and mid slot reds every time I fished this particular stretch of shoreline the last 4 trips... so of course this time we didn't get a single bite.

We picked up another couple of short trout and another jack as we fished the flats heading to the grass line... no puffers this trip and saw a pretty good shark along with several smaller buddies all together as we eased down the grass line in about 2.5' and lots of rays.

Hit Roy's on the way home, the most people I have seen there in a very long time. There was a pretty big tournament going on so hopefully they got a little boost heading into scallop season. I think they were telling people there was a 30 - 45 minute wait as we were leaving... first time I've ever waited except for the opening weekend of scallop season. BTW I didn't see any scallops down south.

Saw 2 FWC officers at the weigh in dock as we headed in and as I waited to load the boat they came into the basin at the county ramp. Didn't bother to check me or any one else, I spoke to one of them as he eased past me and said something along the lines of hoping the tournament folks did better than I did. He sort of laughed and asked if we had a tough day... he went on to say that he wasn't sure why but that the trout sure seemed to be hard to come by this year... Also saw an FWC person (not a sworn officer) as we were launching and overheard him tell the people coming in that he was doing a voluntary survey but didn't hear what he was surveying.

Beautiful day to be on the water but I'm thinking we are going to try down around Horseshoe or CK if things don't get better up this way as its getting sort of ridiculous and not hearing much different on the forum from the North at least on the inshore side. Might try St Marks/Panacea for some light offshore too... nothing like learning new water as long as it doesn't involve lower units etc.

[DixieReb]

Yours is one of 3 reports I read from the weekend. With all the boats I saw headed South on Friday, fishing must not have been good for most of them. I'm like you, it's plain ridiculous down there right now. Thanks for posting, sorry it wasn't better.

[Pirate]

Same song I've been hearing from the entire coast. I do know Aplachicola Bay suffered from a lot of silty river water from April/May Ga rain.

[coreypnich]

My dad and I also fished last Saturday. We caught at least 40 short trout but only 1 keeper barely over 15". We caught the vast majority of ours on gulps, and all of them were in 4-5'.