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My Chattanooga buddy, Pig, joined me in the middle of the week for an Apalachicola trout trip and we slayed 'em. Two weeks ago I was blown off the bay by high winds so I thought I'd go back down and try it again and this time the weather gods smiled on me.

Tuesday morning we launched at the public ramp downtown and headed for the western part of the bay, and this time the day could not have been prettier. A cloudless sky, very little wind and cooperative trout made for a great day on the water. We got into a good bite of white and speckled trout and finished up with an even 100 fish by dark.

We found the white trout in concentrations large enough to warrant breaking out the fly rods and for awhile we were catching them on nearly every cast. We used pink clouser minnows, and a fairly fast strip and they loved it.

Nearly all of our lure-caught trout were caught on either the 1/4 oz glo DOA shrimp, or the glo Norton Bull Minnow.

After a great meal at Bay City Lodge and a restful nights sleep we got up early Wednesday and headed for Owl Creek, off the Apalachicola River, for some bream, bass, and pickerel fishing. We caught some very nice "hand-painted" bream on chartreuse poppers early in the day, and later we headed further up Owl and caught some nice bass and pickerel on Peckenpaugh "yellow Sally" weighted bass fly's.

It was sure fun to be back on the water again with my best friend, catching lots of fish and reliving memories of fishing trips together that stretch back to 1973. I hope we have many more years of good fishing ahead of us, and if not here, then Up There.
od

Glad the weather layed, OD. Nothin beats fishin with a good friend.

Good Report

Good job OD....

Old Dog wrote:We found the white trout in concentrations large enough to warrant breaking out the fly rods and for awhile we were catching them on nearly every cast. We used pink clouser minnows, and a fairly fast strip and they loved it.

We caught some very nice "hand-painted" bream on chartreuse poppers early in the day, and later we headed further up Owl and caught some nice bass and pickerel on Peckenpaugh "yellow Sally" weighted bass fly's.

Music to my ears OD. Great report and good times with your buddy . I fished Owl Creek last winter and it was beautiful. I didn't have the success you had but beautiful nonetheless. Again, great report.

Great trip Old Dog. We were the VERY noisy group at the Bay City dining hall on Tues night, Wed night AND Thurs night. I just got back this morning from a trip that sounded a lot like yours. We fished Wed AM and Thurs AM. Both days were outstanding. We had a four man limit of Specks on Wed by 9:00AM (launched at 7:30). The best part was we never had to throw one short fish back to get the limit. We caught a lot of reds and a few black drum that were well over 10 pounds. Now is the time to be there!!!!!

Saltwater4me, were you with the Nutrina group? I believe that crowd was having some kind of tournament. I know BCL had dredged up all available guides for that large group. And I also know that at least one of those guides, a younger fellow, was lacking in class. We happened to be fishing in a spot that had little enough room for one boat let alone two and he and his clients nearly ran us over. His clients looked very embarrassed and at breakfast Wednesday morning a couple of them said they were, but thought the guide knew me or why else would he have acted so foolish. We DID NOT know each other. Oh well, my friend and I thought that getting into a shouting match with him would not have added to the otherwise enjoyable day we were having and besides that I had left my pistol in the truck.
od

Therer were some new faces around there this year. Our company brings in a fairly large group and apprently they did not have enough guides. We fished around the 98 bridge both days, but apparently a few of the guided trips got to do some site seeing . Sorry you had a bad run in. The ocean is a mighty big place for someone to have to show their butt. Oh well, the fishing and weather were great besides that!!