CS Lee Park - 2lb 8oz Channel Catfish

I'm back from our 7-day family cruise on the Royal Caribbean! Everyone is still wishing we were on the boat though. It was the best Thanksgiving ever, in fact we were actually in St Maarten on Thanksgiving day. We went to Coco Cay (Royal Caribbeans private island in the Bahamas), St Thomas, St Maarten, then two full days at sea on the way home. We cruised on the Freedom of the Seas, a very large modern and kid friendly cruise ship. The weather was nice with only a few rough days at sea during the beginning of our trip. Our rooms were cozy with a very large balcony since we had four staterooms connected. Royal Caribbean also offers the Dreamworks Experience so the kids got to see characters like King Julien, Alex the Lion, Gloria, Kung Fu Panda and Shrek! The staff on board the ship was extremely friendly and professional, completely meeting our needs and going beyond expectations. It was definitly a fun time and like I said, we're all still wishing we are on the boat. :)

I was back near water Friday night fishing the St Johns river. Went to the usual spot at CS Lee Park and only stayed for about 2 hours. It was in the low 60's that night which isn't too bad, it was just the steady wind chill that made it feel colder. I casted one line straight out and one line to the left area where I had recent success. No hits on the leftside line all night. It took awhile, maybe 45 minutes to hour before I saw the first bite on the line straight out. This one kept biting and spitting for several minutes, at least it gave me something to do. Finially snagged it on the lip and reeled it in on my 10 ft rod. To be honest the fish felt heavier in the water than it did on the scale. The fight pressure was strong yet it weighed only 2 LB 8 oz and was released back in the water to grow.

Location: CS Lee Park, Geneva FL
Tackle: 5/0 Owners Light Mutu hook on carolina rig - 3 oz pyramid sinker

Species: Channel Catfish
Weight: 2 LB 8 OZ
Bait: cut mullet

CS Lee Park - 5lb 8oz Catfish - Half Hitch Tackle Warranty Repair

Last night was in the 60's, perfect weather to be outdoors. The full moon has already passed this month, but it was still about 80% full. When I arrived at CS Lee Park around 10:15pm, it was very misty outside, almost borderline light rain. It was enough to wet my skin and cloths. I didn't setup right away, instead I waited in my car and checked my mobile Weather Channel app. Fortunately it looked like a small precipitation area was moving out soon and it would be all clear shortly. When the skies cleared up and the misty rain stopped, I finially setup two lines in the usual hot spots. It really didn't take long when the line straight out was being played with. The hit and run bites kept me anxiously watching the rod tip but everytime I picked up the rod, the fish was gone. It was about the 4th or 5th attempt when I felt the fish and set the hook good. The fight was nice too, as soon as the fish knew it was hooked it immediately splashed topwater. It was a catfish and weighed 5 LB 8 OZ, one of the few 5 LB+ cats I've caught from this spot. The last 5 LB+ I've caught here was about 3 months ago.

The night continued with occassional bites and more playing around. I had a couple short moments where I thought I had one hooked but quickly the fish got off. Also a few times the bait was stripped off my hook. Probably victim of a gar yanking the bait off.

Location: CS Lee Park, Geneva FL
Tackle: 3/0 Owners Light Mutu hook on carolina rig - 3 oz no-roll sinker

Species: Channel Catfish
Weight: 5 LB 8 OZ
Bait: cut mullet

So 2 months ago I used Kel's Rod & Reel service to clean some sand out of a Okuma reel that fell on the beach. The service didn't cost me anything since I had a free reel cleaning certificate. Well, when I finially got the reel back 2-3 weeks later, the baitfeeding clicker was not clicking anymore. I didn't want to take it back there again, so I was looking for another warranty service center for Okuma reels. My friend used one in Panama City, FL called Half Hitch Tackle. They are a warranty repair center for Okuma and they fixed his reel to work flawlessly (which had the same clicker problem). So today, I'm shipping my non-clicking reel to Panama City. I figured it's a good time since I'll be away from town for awhile in the coming days. Should have my reel back when I return home, or at least the repair almost done by then.

CS Lee Park - 2lb 8oz Channel Catfish

Cold night in central Florida, temps were in the 50's and the wind made it feel colder.

Location: CS Lee Park, Geneva FL

Species: Channel Catfish
Weight: 2 LB 8 OZ
Bait: cut mullet

CS Lee Park - Grand Slam Catfish

Arrived about 10PM and setup in my usual spot. I baited two rods with cut mullet and another with nightcrawlers. The worms didn't produce anything tonight, however, cut mullet was putting fish on the hook all night. Normally I cast straight out across the river where I usually catch them, but oddly I didn't get any bites there. All of the action came from the far left side, kinda close to the shore actually. Also all of the fish caught tonight had slammed the bait as if they were starving. They weren't playing around that's for sure.

First hit was good, and it felt good too. Reeling in against the current it felt alot bigger than what it really was. It still weighed just under 4 LB though. I casted out again to the same spot with another piece of mullet. It wasn't 5-10 minutes when another catfish slammed it. This one was smaller about 2 LB. Later in the night I had another solid bite, started reeling in and felt the power of a bigger fish. Unfortunately after about 10 seconds the hook popped out and it was gone. Damn! I know it was a big catfish too because my leader line had slime all over it. About 1:30am it started sprinkling and I was out of bait anyways, besides the nightcrawlers, so I packed up to get some ice.

Location: CS Lee Park, Geneva FL
Tackle: 1/0 Owners Light Mutu hook on carolina rig - 3 oz no-roll sinker

Species: Channel Catfish
Weight: 3 LB 14 OZ
Bait: cut mullet

Species: Channel Catfish
Weight: 2 LB 2 OZ
Bait: cut mullet

The smaller 1 LB blue catfish (bottom) was caught by a commercial fisherman while he was killing time with me. I learned alot from this guy from trotlines to some of his fishing stories, plus he gave me one of his bigger hooks and some bait when I ran out. So in return I gave him one of my rod holders that he was pretty interested in.

CS Lee Park - 3 LB 4 OZ Channel Catfish

Back to CS Lee Park last night for some more night fishing fun. Temps were in the low 60's with a slight north breeze. The first hour or so I didn't catch anything, but I was getting some bites. It wasn't until 12:20am when I caught the only fish of the night, a 3 lb catfish. Before landing this catfish, it got stuck in some weeds literally 2 feet from the shore. I'm reeling in this fish then all of a sudden it just stops. Tried to pull it through the weeds but I also didn't want to break the leader line. So I ended up feeding it some slack line hoping it would swim out of the weeds. Tried this a couple times and it finially came loose. One in the cooler!

Things really slowed down after 1:00am, so that was it for the night. My next fishing trip will be somewhere in New Smyrna probably. I used the last bag of frozen mullet last night so I need to restock more catfish bait anyways.

Location: CS Lee Park, Geneva FL
Tackle: 6/0 Owners Light Mutu hook on carolina rig - 3 oz no-roll sinker

Species: Channel Catfish
Weight: 3 LB 4 OZ
Bait: cut mullet

CS Lee Park - 2 Catfish and The One That Got Away

Wednesday (last night) was the first day of the approaching cold front. The temperatures started to drop by late afternoon when gusty winds came through central Florida. By evening it was in the low 60's, with breezy winds and a few strong gusts. The moon tonight was half full, and the fishing forecast said GO FISHING. You don't have to pull my arm though, I'll go fishing regardless! LOL

Anyway, I arrived at CS Lee Park around 10-10:30pm. The river is still flooded, no surprise there. But the best part about the water levels being high is that my fishing spot is closer to the parking lot. So while I was fishing, I was just leaning up against my car watching my rods for a bite. Plus I almost got attacked by fire ants while standing in the grass. When I say almost attacked, I mean there were several crawling up my right pants leg. I must have stepped on an ant hill that I didn't see. Luckily I noticed before they got very far and brushed them all off.

Ok so the bite last night was pretty good, especially for the hour between 11pm and midnight. I think that's the timeframe where I caught the two catfish you see below. Both catfish started with small bites for several minutes before self setting the hook in their mouth. Maybe it's because my hook size was a little too big, or they were just tasting the bait before inhaling it.

Then it was after 1am, not sure exactly what time but I hooked into something that was doing the same behavior. It started with small bites, it would shake my line a little bit and then stop. This kept going on for awhile until it was finially hooked. The fight was pretty nice, it was definitly alot bigger than the two I already caught. During the fight it kept trying to shake me off and even made a couple nice splashes on topwater. Usually I can tell if it's a gar or catfish by the way it fights. A Florida gar usually makes quick dashes once hooked but quickly gives up. A good fighting catfish, however, will keep you on your toes the whole way in. Another one is the Longnose Gar, which is much more powerful and bigger than the Florida Gar. It doesn't give up like it's smaller cousin either. Common to see splashes on topwater and really fast long runs during the fight for longnose gars. I've had some big catfish splash the topwater during fights too. So basically, this big fish I hooked didn't make it to the shore but I was very close! I had it within maybe 5-6 feet and all of a sudden the hook pops out. All I had left was a bare hook! My best guess is it probably was a Longnose Gar or Channel Catfish around 10 lb. Dang that would've been nice to catch! :)

Location: CS Lee Park, Geneva FL
Tackle: 6/0 Owners Light Mutu hook on carolina rig - 3 oz no-roll sinker

Species: Channel Catfish
Weight: 2 LB
Bait: cut mullet

Species: Channel Catfish
Weight: 1 LB 6 OZ
Bait: cut mullet

Severe Flooding on St Johns River

Wednesday night on a full moon I headed out to do some catfishing on the river. First stop was CS Lee Park, and when I got there I was stunned. Like most boating dock/ramps, there's a floating metal dock at the end of the ramp. This section is now a floating island in the middle of the river at CS Lee Park. The water levels were so high, the entire wooden dock was completely submerged under water. I fished there for about an hour or so but didn't catch anything. The current was very strong too, even my 3oz no roll sinkers were cruising down current.

I left CS Lee to checkout the damage at Mullet Lake Park. I love Mullet Lake Park, it's pretty much where I started catfishing. Out on the bank, a friend caught the biggest Channel Catfish we've seen so far (17 LB). It's also where I battled with my first American Shad. Just alot of cool memories there. The water levels at Mullet Lake Park were right up to the top of the dock with alot of floating vegetation washed in. At least you could still see the dock here. I've never seen this before, and it's very strange to see. I don't think those wooden docks were built to withstand being submerged under water either. Really sucks for boaters since the river is pretty dangerious for them right now. There could be anything underneath you and you probably won't even recognize your favorite fishing spots LOL. Here's a couple pictures of Mullet Lake Park.

CS Lee Park - 3lb Channel Catfish

A Tuesday night with a new moon. Every star in the sky was visible. It was almost 1:00am when I was about to packup to go. Then I noticed a large gator swimming in the river, which I have to admit I was a little intimidated. It was a big gator. I watched it swim slowly towards my honey hole, and I figured nothing would be biting after this gator passes by. The gator was about 20-30 feet from my line when my rod was getting some bite taps. Reeled in the slack and felt a fish on, this one I could feel the head shaking and it was trying to shake loose the whole time I was reeling him in. I was worried the big gator would notice the disturbance in the water and try to eat my catch but fortunately it didn't phase him. The catch was a 3 lb Channel Catfish.

Location: C.S. Lee Park
Tackle: Owners Light Mutu 5/0 hook on carolina rig - 3 oz no roll sinker

Species: Channel Catfish
Weight: 3 LB
Bait: cut frozen mullet

CS Lee Park - 4lb 13oz Channel Catfish

Sunday night I saw a break in the weather to do some catfishing over at CS Lee Park. The rain looked like it was coming after midnight so I only had a couple hours to fish. Using cut mullet, I caught a nice 4 lb 13 oz channel catfish. I had another bite later on but when I reeled in the slack, the hook popped out. The sprinkles started around midnight and as soon as I got in my car to leave, it was pouring rain.

CS Lee Park - 6lb & 9lb Channel Catfish

Grabbed some fresh frozen mullet out of the freezer and headed down to CS Lee Park last night. Probably arrived there around 10pm and casted out to my usual spot. Got a few bites early on cut mullet. Then I got a solid bite that kept tapping at my rod, I picked up my pole and saw the fish swimming left with my line in his mouth. Reeled in the slack and it was fish on! It was a nice catfish about 6 lb. Not bad! Switched rods and casted out to the same spot with another gut chunk of mullet. Maybe 15 minutes later and it was another good bite, again swimming left with the current. Another fish on and this one felt bigger. This one was over 9 lb with more power and I was working with a 20# test leader. So after a little game of tug o' war, got it on the bank and saw it was gut hooked. Normally I wouldn't keep a catfish this big, but since it was gut hooked I didn't think it would survive a release. Now I had two big catfish in the cooler and I needed ice so I had to leave. In only two hours of fishing too!

Caught the first 6 lb catfish on the Okuma Classic Pro XP conventional reel and then got the bigger 9lb+ catfish on my old reliable Okuma ABF-65 spinning reel.

Location: C.S. Lee Park
Tackle: Owners Light Mutu 5/0 hook on carolina rig - 3 oz sinker

Species: Channel Catfish
Weight: 9 LB 6 OZ
Bait: cut frozen mullet

Species: Channel Catfish
Weight: 5 LB 11 OZ
Bait: cut frozen mullet

Personal Best - Big Catch Longnose Gar 20 lb 8 oz

Last night I was at CS Lee Park with a full arsenal. I brought with me some frozen cut bait and nightcrawlers to get started fishing. Once I had lines in the water, it was time to chum up some baitfish. With oatmeal and small pieces of bread, I threw the mix out in the shallow water by the shore. After 15-20 minutes, I grabbed my castnet to see if I can catch some live bait. It only took a few good casts and I had plenty of mud minnows. I used my light action rod to catch a few live bluegills too. Towards the end of the night I switched over to live bait and nightcrawlers. After the switch, I seemed to get alot more bites on live bait. I missed a few big ones too. One almost dragged my rod in the water because my drag wasn't set right.

Well anyways, it was the end of my night and I had another bite. After I made sure the hook was set, this guy was really pulling. I thought my drag was too loose or something, but no, it was just a big fish trying to get away. This one I fought a good couple minutes. I thought it was a big catfish the way it splashed around in the middle of the river but once I got a good look at it, it was a big Longnose Gar. Still a pretty cool catch since I haven't seen one of these in awhile. It's been a long time since I've caught a Longnose Gar, my previous one was about 9 LB almost a year ago. I can catch Florida Gar any given night, but they don't get any bigger than 4-5 LB. The Longnose Gar, though, can be common in the 5-15 lb range and the Florida record is 41 LB.

This Longnose Gar was 54" long and 20 LB 8 Oz, which qualifies for another Big Catch certificate from the FWC. The minimum requirements for the longnose is 20 lb and/or 50" long. Looks like I'll be sending in another application soon. =)

Location: C.S. Lee Park
Tackle: Owners Light Mutu 5/0 hook on carolina rig - 3 oz sinker

Species: Longnose Gar
Weight: 20 LB 8 OZ
Bait: live bluegill

Channel Catfish 6 lb 10 oz - CS Lee Park

I'm back from vacation! Dealing with fishing withdrawals all week I quickly cured that by getting some rods in the water down by CS Lee Park. It must have been around midnight by the time me and Kyle got setup. There wasn't much action throughout the night there. We were actually thinking about switching spots but I decided to just stick it out where we were already posted. And with my patience, I was rewarded with a really nice catfish. Sometime around 1:30AM I got a nice hit and a great fight from a 6 lb 10 oz catfish. This cat was pulling line like crazy, haven't had a catfish fight like that in months. Got it in the cooler and was ready for more. But that was the only fish from CS Lee Park. On the way home we stopped at Mullet Lake Park by the dock where Kyle caught another small catfish, too small to keep though.

Location: C.S. Lee Park
Tackle: Owners Light Mutu size 2 hook on carolina rig - 1 oz sinker

Species: Channel Catfish
Weight: 6 LB 10 OZ
Bait: nightcrawlers

One more catfish before the roadtrip

Due to a power outage at my house and a week long vacation, this post was delayed for 9 days. The events in this post happened on the evening of 7/18/11.

Me and Kyle setout for a final trip before I was leaving to pickup my son from his moms' house in Ohio and visit family in Indiana. I believe we started around 6-7PM at CS Lee Park. It was still light out but we were waiting for sundown. No bites or anything for awhile. In fact, the bites didn't start until it was dark. I ended up catching a nice little 1 lb 4 oz catfish after sundown. I got another catfish too, but it was too small to keep. Back in the water it swam away, perhaps I'll get him another day. :)

So when I got home around 10PM, I noticed the street lights were out and all the houses were dark. A transformer was blown which is normally no big deal. But the sucky part is we had to finish getting ready to leave for our roadtrip. On top of that, the power didn't even come back until 4AM. Here's a picture of the catfish I caught. I had to use a battery operated lantern to get some light. I was basically cleaning this fish in the dark.

Location: C.S. Lee Park
Tackle: Owners Light Mutu size 2 hook on carolina rig - 1 oz sinker

Species: Channel Catfish
Weight: 1 LB 4 OZ
Bait: nightcrawlers

Saturday Night Chasing Channel Cat

Last night the moon was around 95% full. It was a stormy night from Altamonte Springs to Oviedo area but I noticed the storm was headed south-southeast. I saw a good opportunity to get some fishing done at CS Lee Park since the storms were avoiding that area completely. With two poles, one with nightcrawlers and one with cut bait, I was targeting small and large fish. I first caught a small catfish about 12" long using a nightcrawler and size 2 hook. Then my other pole caught a florida gar using a dead shiner and size 3/0 hook. All of my hooks are the Owners Mutu Light style, extremely sharp and very effective hook set ratio.
Later in the evening Kyle and Tara came out to join me by the bank while the fish were still biting. Tara came out with two Florida Gars using dead shiners. I also caught another Channel Catfish, this one was a bigger 2 lb 5 oz using nightcrawlers again with the smaller size 2 hook. It was around 3am and we called it a night, the mosquitos were getting bad and the fish were not as active. The two catfish I took home on ice.

Location: C.S. Lee Park
Tackle: Owners Light Mutu size 2 hook on carolina rig - 1 oz sinker

Species: Channel Catfish
Weight: 2 LB 5 OZ
Bait: nightcrawlers

Shad Rally @ C.S. Lee Park

The last derbie rally was held today, this time it was at the Jolly Gator restaurant next to C.S. Lee Park. Capt Tom Van Horn hosted the event and talked about casting, retrieving, lures, and rigs. There was a raffle drawing at the end for free fishing gear. The raffle works like this, you get a free ticket just for being at the rally. You also have the option to purchase extra tickets which is $5 for 6 tickets. The proceeds benefit the Hook Kids on Fishing program. Me and Cody got our free tickets, and I also purchased the 6 extra tickets giving us 8 total raffle entries. A few people went home with a ton of free stuff but we also made out pretty well. Two of our tickets were picked in the raffle drawing and here's what we got!

XL Long Sleeve Shirt (not pictured)
Sufix 12 lb fishing line - 4 individual packs
Trigger X 4" saltwater mullet lures -pack of 6
2 certificates for a free reel cleaning service at Kel's
3 coupons for $10 off $50 purchase at Mosquito Creek Outdoors
some free stickers and a SeaTow koozie



After the rally, Cody and I had lunch at the Jolly Gator restaurant and enjoyed their delicious burgers. I will definitly visit there again one day. After lunch we fished for a little bit at Lee Park but I quickly noticed there wasn't anything going on there. We played around for a bit and left to Mullet Lake Park. At Mullet Lake, my friend David showed up and we had a good time fishing together. We both hooked a couple shad each, but just couldn't bring them in. They made leaps out of the water and drag screaming runs, still very much active.

My 1st Specks @ C.S. Lee Park

Today was an early release day at Codys' school so I picked him up at 2PM. I checked the weather when we got home and then headed out to C.S. Lee Park. I wanted to checkout the shad run in that area to see how thick they are. I first tried a red jighead with chartreuse 2" squirmin' grub from Bass Pro Shop. This is my most popular shad lure, but I wasn't getting any bites though. It was a cloudy day with alot of overcast. With that in mind, I wanted to see how darker colors would work instead of my usual bright colored lures. I changed the red/chartreuse jig to a black jighead with a smoke/silver flake 2" squirmin' grub. After a couple casts, I had a bite and reeled it in. Turns out it was my very first crappie! A rather nice size one too. From then on, I had specks on my menu. Overall, I caught 5 specks and kept 3 of them. The longest crappie I caught today was 12" long.

Catch: Crappie "speck"
Size: 12"
Lure: 1/16oz Black jighead w/ 2" Squirmin' Grub (smoke/silver flake)



Here's a photo of all three getting ready to be filleted.

C.S. Lee Park report

This afternoon after picking up Cody, we headed out to C.S. Lee Park to find my first shad. I had made my own rigs earlier in the day and wanted to test them out too. Each rig allows me to use two lures instead of just one, giving me twice the attraction and hopefully more fish.

Here's my homemade rig:

At first my top lure was a Road Runner Crappie Thunder 1/16oz electric chicken color and then below that was a Nungesser Shad Dart pink/white/yellow. I fished that setup for about an hour and got a small Largemouth Bass on the shad dart.
So then I took off the Crappie Thunder and replaced it with a 1.5" gold spoon, and nothing. I called it a day around 5:30 to head back home. Tomorrow I might try Mullet Lake Park with my homemade rigs and see what happens.