Fishing Reports

With the recent arrival of warmer weather conditions, Baitfish will soon invade Tampa Bay. The pelagics will be hot on their heels, and the Mac attack will be in full force. St. Patty's Day usually marks the arrival of King and Spanish Mackerel. Down South, commercial fishermen have experienced an awesome year for Kingfish. Captain Jonnie Brown of Naples fished the Isle of Capri this year and reported filling his 1250lb quota daily hand lining schooly Kings in the 10-20lb range. These fish will be heading our way following schools of Baitfish up the gulf. Fish the edges of large pods of Sardines, Glass Minnows, Ballyhoo. Black-outs on your fish-finder will help you to locate fish at deeper depths. Trolling a wire rig or floating balloons will produce good results. A light drag and ...full report

The first week of March has some good Bass fishing on Lake Toho. With our trips being of mixed nature, some with live wild Shiners and some with artificial baits, this body of water has not let us down. Lake Toho has been fishing great this year. Many may think when a cold front hits, you need to switch to wild Shiners in order to catch Bass, but we have done very good using artificial baits to consistently catch the Bass out here. Beds have popped up all over the place out here, in waters from under a foot deep to 5 foot deep. For the most part, the Bass we have spotted around them have been cruising around. Gobblets Cove, Friars Cove and Whaley’s Landing area have been some good hot spots for us. Baits of choice have been 7 and 10 inch worms, steel shads and one ounce spinner baits. Water ...full report

Hello from Anna Maria. It’s been a slow consistent warm-up in these parts but the water temperature is down for this time of year. I have been having some great fishing action. Redfish don’t mind the cool water temp one bit, they range as far north has Virginia so a water temp of 59 degrees is mild to them. Redfish remain as my primary target as they always do in cooler water temps. They have been very consistent from day to day guaranteeing action on good fish from 16 to 33 inches. We have been getting plenty of slot fish in the 18 to 27 inch class for the box and almost every day Reds over 30 inches. Some of the better days we have been landing as many as 25 per trip, some are smaller but it’s those big bull Redfish that make the trip. Nothing like a 32 inch Redfish on 10 ...full report

January 2010 was arguably one of the coldest months on record. With the jet stream sagging well into Florida we had 10 consecutive days of overnight temperatures below freezing! Those freezing temperatures had a significant effect on the fishing and we will be coping with those effects in the weeks and months to come. This in NO WAY means that the fishing isn't any good! Water temperatures have already raised substantially both inshore and in the gulf, and after that long cold spell the fish are starting to feed. The Trout fishing has been nothing short of spectacular and the Redfish action continues to get better and better. With the worst of the cold behind us and temperatures on the rise the Snook fishing should continue to improve through February. Snook are becoming more active ...full report

Jim, David, Jesse and three others joined the Lady Pamela II for a shared fishing charter in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. With six different people on board, everybody wants to do something different, so that was our plan. We started with trolling gear in the water, catching King Mackerel and Bonito fish. Then we relocated with live bait looking for a Shark bite and ended up fighting a Warsaw Grouper. Our last pit stop was to a wreck with a live Bonito and a Barracuda ate. What a day. Tight Lines! Captain David Ide Lady Pamela II Sportfishing Charters Fort Lauderdale, Florida www.ladypamela2.com ladypamela2@bellsouth.net 954-761-8045 ...full report

Well those of you that live in our great state FLORIDA know that the weather has not been very Florida like for the past few days. I’m afraid that old man winter has started his stay. With the mornings being cold and not really warming up until later in the day its made that early morning bite hard to come by. The wind has changed from a warm tropical breeze from the south to a not so warm constant 10 to 15 from the north east. This type of wind will keep our tides lower than normal and some times make it so that there is no returning water at all. What I like to do on days like this. Is find area where we can put the boat in a small cove where the wind is blocked by the mangroves or a bend in a creek where the bottom is cover with rocks or kelp stalks. These two things are some of the ...full report

Started fishing at 6:45am. Quit at 3pm. 12 Boats in club tournament. It seemed all but 2 boats headed upstream. The results were as follows. 36 Bass caught, 1st place 10.8 for 3 Bass. They looked like footballs. 2nd place 10.1 for 5 Bass. Big Bass was 4 even. Lipless crankbaits (chrome/black) ripped through the grass seemed to be the lure of choice with best results. Anglers said you'd pick up 1 here & there. Winds were 20-30 mph, air temp 70, water temp 59-61. Personally did not see any beds yet. ...full report

Large schools of Redfish continue to patrol the backwater creek systems here in Jacksonville. Since the water temperature is cold, the packs of Redfish are usually hunkered down along oyster beds. It can be pretty easy fishing, or I should say "catching" once the schools are located. Last week during the last of the falling and first of the incoming tides I had outstanding trips of over 35 Redfish each day. We were able to sight cast to several Reds in shallow water using soft plastics and fished deeper holes and drop-offs on the higher water with quarter once jigs with mud minnows and shrimp. Wednesday I had the opportunity to fish with a longtime client and friend Kelly Stacy and two of his business partners. We fished two spots all day and went through 7 dozen mud minnows and ...full report