With the trout bite on fire you would think I would have an easy day today. God knows I found them yesterday. We had a 12 person 3 boat trip for Super Strike Charters. The group was from New York. they wanted nothing but bull reds. This changed all our game plans. The reds have been almost non existent and truthfully with the hot trout action we have not really been targeting them. One of the boats had already been setting up for trout and I ran by him and told him that the customers just wanted bull reds. He pulled his anchor and we made the long run down the river.
We looked at the outside around the rocks but the seas were too rough. There was no way we could safely fish there. We went inside and I tied to a platform. The other boat that ran with me went further up behind a wing dam. We were near but not in sight of each other. We started getting a lot of hard heads. John, who was the one lobbying for the reds the most, has a good one on and the fight is on.
This is what he asked for and he got it.
After more hardheads, a couple of black drum and small croakers I decided to move a bit closer to the rocks.
That slight move was the difference. On our first drop in the new area about 60 feet from where we were I had to go to work. 3 of the four guys were hooked up to big red fish. My lucky horseshoe was working for me. After a Chinese fire drill I had 3 fish on the deck with hooks still in them. Although it was early in the day the beers came out for celebration once the triple crown picture was taken.
These guys being from NY and LI have gotten stripers but the fight of the redfish was above and beyond anything a striper could give them. The comparison was mentioned almost every time a bull red hit the deck. One of the guys Mike had fished all his life but only fresh water. He had all he could handle with these 12- 20 pound tireless fighters. Once at the boat the fish would go out and visit the neighborhood again so I would put up the net for a while more. Mike had his best ever trophy and memories were made.
After spending the morning fighting a bunch of bull reds it was time to head to the trout spot. Our day was already a success. Each guy at least caught 4 bull reds I think the high hook had 6. They wanted and we kept 4 bulls. At the dock there was a discussion about the big fish pool but ours was the winning boat I think.
We went up to where I was yesterday and things had changed with little or no water movement. One boat picked up a few trout but the bite was almost dead. We got sting rays, catfish, and small croakers. Our buddy boat called it and headed in. I decided to go back to a spot I had just left with no action at all. This was our last ditch effort. It seems the bite was about to start. We managed 8 nice trout and 3 or 4 throwbacks before we called it. The other 2 boats were already back in and were waiting for us.
If you had told me I was going to target bull reds today I would have called you crazy. They asked and we delivered.
Life is Good!
Fishing is not a matter of life or death. It's more important than that.
CAPT HOOP -- OUR FREEDOM
11-30-2013, 09:05 PM
Bull reds
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