Killer day on the South Shore
I had some friends in town who wanted to get out this weekend so plan was for them to meet at my house at 5:30 and meet my buddy Josh and his crew at the ramp with his boat and all fish together. Well 5:45 comes around and no sign of them so I set off to the Cockroach Bay ramp alone ( If you ever fish with me, be on time. This in not the first time I have left someone ). I got to the ramp at 6:50 and Josh an I launched our boats and set off for the Skyway.
With the warm weather we might have been able to get bait somewhere closer but I would rather head to the Skyway where I know I can get it 100%. After anchoring and getting set up just a couple tosses of the net and my 30 Gal well was full.
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We decided to hit Piney Point on the way back up to Cockroach. We fished there for about 30 min but there was no signs of bait, fish, mullet, or any life at all so we decided to head more North and hit the Cockroach flats. The tide was - 0.6 so there was hardly any water on the flats. Josh didn't want to push his boat so he waded the outside bar while I pushed my boat through the real skinny parts and over the bar. I was looking for potholes and wakes. I saw some movement about 100 yards away and quietly headed that way. When I got within casting distance I anchored and threw out 2 bats of chummers. The were getting chased and I knew it was game on. I had a bait out for about 30 seconds and my drag starts to scream. I was thinking nice Red but it turned out to be my personal best Trout at just shy of 27". I send out another bait and as soon as a damn bird went to dive on it he was a couple seconds late as a nice Red beat him to the punch. After a good fight I get him in and he was the perfect size for the grill at yet again, just shy of 27", so in the well he goes. I caught a couple more lower slot Reds and was ready to change it up a bit so I went back to meet Josh and I told him I wanted to take him back into the LMR.
We set up in my favorite spot ( the same one I took BassinAssassin to ) and managed to get both boats set up how we want and slung out some chummers. They were getting exploded like crazy and for the next 30 min between the three of us we caught around 20 mid 20" Snook like the one pictured below. There were many double and triple hook ups. The bite died down after that due to all the commotion in such a tight spot so we went up river. We got a few Snook, Trout, and Reds around the 41 area and the SSS cut but not a real steady bite. After about 1 1/2 hours we are close to calling it a day but I wanted to go back to our first spot on the way out of the river.
We get set up again and we start getting pretty good action but not like we did in the AM. After about 15 min we had about 5 Snook to show for it. Then out of nowhere Josh's reel starts screaming like I have never heard before and the water erupts. The fish covered 30 yards in a matter of 2 seconds and was going nuts. Then he tries to take him back into the groves but somehow Josh turned it. After a good fight he gets it boatside at 35" and the best fish of the day. All the commotion from that ran every fish out of there so the day ended on that. It was a killer day and fun putting Josh on his personal best Snook and me getting my best Trout. Not a bad way to kick off my first trip in 2013.
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