Wednesday, May 15, 2013

Skinny Water Surprise

Lately I have found a nice pattern in some really skinny water. An area right by one of my favorite launches that I have paddled past dozens of times was showing plenty of signs of life on a trip last week. Mullet were huddled up and causing quite a commotion. I saw a few tails in the area but the ones I was close enough to distinguish were mullet tails. I decided it was worth a few casts, and my curiosity was rewarded with a nice 23 inch redfish.


I tried to duplicate that success and wound up with one small snook off of that same flat before the action slowed. I was shocked however that I had even caught anything in this area as it was barely holding 5 inches of water in some spots. I was excited though that I already had 2/3 of a slam, so I paddled across the bay to find a trout. I rounded out the slam pretty quick with a few small trout, but got sidetracked when I started spotting some very large snook. These fish became my sole focus, and I was almost successful. Right off the bat I had some explosions on a topwater, but didn't connect and they wised up to the spook very quickly. I spent the better part of the next two hours trying to get one on anything I had in my tackle box. I had follow after follow on weedless rigged exudes but could not entice a strike. Most other lures, especially anything on a jig head, would get taken by trout before I could get them near the snook I was seeing. Finally on a last ditch effort with a DOA shrimp, I hooked up. The fish ran immediately at me and promptly wound up behind me, spinning my kayak around in no time. I kept pressure and got the fish close enough to land, and in a lapse of judgement let some slack in the line while reaching for my camera. The fish laughed at the opportunity, gave a headshake, and the lure popped right out. My estimation was around 28-29 inches, and this was actually one of the SMALLER fish I saw. 

I was defeated after spending that much time and finally getting a bite and losing it. However, I still headed home with a decent slam and some new found knowledge about one of my favorite fishing spots. Overall, the day was a success.

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