NSB and Dunlawton Report - Lady Fish

The no name tropical storm last weekend is still having an effect on fishing. The intracoastal waterway seems to be shutdown for the most part with all the freshwater draining into the water system. Flooding is still a major problem on the St Johns River too. It will be awhile before things settle down, but that won't stop me from fishing in the meantime.

Last night I made another trip to NSB for some night fishing. Stopped by the North Causeway in NSB first, but the lights were still out on the pier. I jigged for awhile with gulp shrimp but didn't get any bites.

Next I visited the South Causeway and the report from there was more trash fish. Both the causeways had people in just about every corner, so I took the 15 minute drive to Port Orange to fish the Dunlawton pier. When I arrived at Dunlawton, several people were leaving and the reports again, nothing but catfish.

I stayed for awhile anyways, but didn't catch anything on live mullet. In fact I didn't get any good hits on mullet. Nobody was. The only thing that was working was fresh dead shrimp. Using the shrimp on a pompano rig I caught 4 Lady Fish. I was hooking into them one after another. I finially had enough and headed home when I concluded it wasn't going to be a good night. I'm hoping things get back to normal soon. Been wanting to try my luck around the jetties at the Ponce Inlet. There's a state park on both the north side and south side, but there's also a $5 fee.

Dunlawton Bridge - 4 lb Sail Catfish

Stopped by Dunlawton Bridge last night for a few hours. The sustained winds were strong, at least 15-20mph. I was going to jig for flounder but didn't even rig the pole since it was so gusty. There were schools of mullet under every light almost, literally one castnet toss and I was ready to fish.
Using pieces of dead shrimp on 1/0 owner light mutu hooks, I caught a few small catfish and a pigfish. Those pigfish make a funny croaking sound thats pretty loud, I've always heard they are good live bait. I don't know if the croaking sound has anything to do with it, but anyways I let it go since it was too big.
On the bigger 10' rod with a 5/0 owner light mutu hook, I tried cut bait and live mullet. With a piece of cut herring, I almost caught a sail cat but the hook popped out when I got him close to the pier. With live finger mullet, I was able to catch a bigger sail cat. This one I got on the dock and weighed it at 4 LB 2 OZ. That is my personal best Sail Cat (Gafftopsail Catfish) so far. All fish were released.

Location: Dunlawton Bridge, Port Orange
Tackle: 5/0 circle hook on carolina rig - 4 oz pyramid sinker

Species: Gafftopsail Catfish
Weight: 4 LB 2 OZ
Bait: live finger mullet

Baby Sail Catfish & Lady Fish - Dunlawton Bridge

Night fished the Dunlawton bridge again last night, this time with Kyle and Tara. I arrived around 10:30pm and was looking for finger mullet to castnet. Spotted a few small schools early and grabbed a couple, but not very many at first. Though as the night went on the schools of mullet were more abundant so it worked out. First I used small pieces of shrimp and caught alot of baby Sail Catfish one after another. In fact, thats all we caught on shrimp. I also had two lines out with live finger mullet and we were getting pretty good bites on them. I think a majority of the bites were catfish and lady fish. With the live mullet I hooked a small hardhead catfish and a nice size Lady Fish. Kyle caught a bigger Lady Fish and a HUGE Stone Crab. Unfortunately right now Stone Crab season is closed in Florida so I couldn't harvest this delicious crabs' claw. We released it back in the water unharmed. For the record, Stone Crab season is October 15 - May 15

Dunlawton (Port Orange) - Lady Fish & 15" Sand Trout

My friend Kyle and I were seeking out some night fishing at the New Smyrna causeways Wednesday evening. We arrived at the South bridge first and netted some finger mullet. But with too many other lines in the water there, we didn't even bother getting our rods out. At least we had some bait so we loaded up and took a short drive to the North causeway. After scouting the situation there, it was a nightmare waiting to happen with lines crossing and no room to cast or even retrieve your line. So it was then we decided to try a new spot that we haven't seen before, the Port Orange Causeway. It was only a 15 minute drive from our location so we headed to Port Orange.

More commonly known as the Dunlawton Bridge, it spans the Halifax river and the Intracoastal Waterway. We got there around 2am and it was fishing time, yay! I started with pieces of frozen shrimp on a pompano rig and caught a couple Lady Fish. One of them I used as cut bait since I've heard it's suppose to be really oily and bloody. With that in mind I casted out a chunk of lady fish and waited. I got a nice hit on it for a second, but that was it. Next I setup another rod with a live finger mullet, this is actually my new reel that I haven't used much. It's my first conventional reel and it's definitly a learning experience. I can't really cast that far with it yet, but it works really well for fishing off of causeway piers. Using live mullet on a 3/0 owners light mutu hook, I caught another Lady Fish and then I hooked a nice 15" Sand trout. I capped off the night with a tiny little 5" sailfin catfish using a pieces of shrimp.

Total tally for me was 3 lady fish, 1 sand trout and a baby sailfin catfish.