A Day Fishing with Cody - NSB Redfish

My son Cody had the day off school Thursday for a jewish holiday and I was off work by 1pm. We had all day to mess around so I took him to New Smyrna for some fishing. We each only brought a jigging pole so we were working artificials. First stop we arrived at a boat dock across the street from the popular bar in New Smyrna. Tide was very low. We walked out from the parking lot and noticed a bunch of fiddler crabs scattering about along the shoreline so we walked over there. Cody got a kick out of hunting the fiddler crabs and trying to catch them. When he finds one he traps it with a small cup and then yells for me to retrieve his catch LOL. We did this for awhile and actually caught some nice sized fiddlers. I put the ones we caught in a bucket so Cody could watch them. After we were done with the crabs we walked over to the wood dock and started throwing the jigs. I didn't have any luck but on one of Cody's casts I was watching the jig in the water. Cody wasn't paying attention, but as he's reeling in I see a small flounder chasing his bait for a second. Cody had already reeled up, not knowing there was a fish chasing his lure. He almost got one. That was it for that spot, so we moved to the South Causeway.

There we fished by the shallow area near the parking lot. Throwing a white gulp swimming mullet I casted as far as I could with a 1/4 jighead. As soon as it hit water I felt a bite and it was fish on. Nothing spectacular but it was a cute little redfish about 12" long. Gave it a safe release after a quick photo. While we were there Cody noticed a lure stuck in the water near the seawall. I grabbed a trebble hook and started playing around trying to snag it. It lifted up easily, it wasn't even stuck to anything. I was surprised how easy it came up. Inspected it and decided to keep it, it's a chartruese silver Catch Jr Mirrolure. The hooks are rusted out but those can be replaced. Free lure, can't beat that!

We hit the flat bridge after this and noticed the wind had picked up on that side of town. We didn't spend too much time here but I did jig the bottom for a little bit with a white twister tail. Felt the flounder tap and hooked a nice flounder, but my knot failed when I tried to lift it out of the water. oops! That was it for us, we had a good day and it was time to start heading back.

My First Snook! NSB South Causeway

Another night trip to the intercoastal waterway, this time we stopped at the South Causeway in NSB. For the most part we were jigging artificials. I tried the shallow area near the parking lot, and felt a bite but it let go. Kept trying the Gulp new penny shrimp and finially hooked the fish. It turned out to be a small snook, which in fact, is my very first snook ever caught! It was only about 12" long so a quick release was important. Here are photos of the baby snook with a mouthful of gulp shrimp LOL

Happy New Years! NSB South Causeway

Found a break in the chilly weather so Cody and I geared up for a little sunrise fishing. Woke up early around 5:30am and headed east. First pitstop at 38 Live Bait to find they were out of live shrimp, kind of strange. Didn't matter, thats not what I was after anyway. I got a couple dozen small finger mullet, really nice size too. Biggest were about 4" long. I wanted some fiddler crabs but they were out of those too. So with the finger mullet we headed to our spot. Today I picked South Causeway as our first destination. Some guys were at the spot I originally wanted so me and Cody setup on the deadend of the pier. We had the whole spot to ourselves which was nice. Saw a beautiful clear sunrise so I took a photo.



We were getting bites but it was those pesky small blues eating the tails off our mullet. Everytime I'd see our rod bounce and go check the bait, only to find a half consumed mullet on the hook. Finially hooked one and I let Cody reel it in. Only fish of the day too. My son was bragging how he caught 1 and I didn't of course. LOL



We tried a few other spots, the one boat dock across the road from bowling alley and then we tried Sleepy Hollow. No luck at either spot. Found another tick on my pants after walking through Sleepy Hollow again. No bueno.

Daytime NSB and Night Flat Bridge Report 12/19

Knowing there's a major cold front coming this weekend, we probably won't be fishing on Saturday. In fact it's the first Saturday in 6-7 weeks that I won't fish, wow! I want to go but forecast says the daytime high is only 60, with nighttime lows in the 30's. Plus I really don't want to get sick right before Christmas.
Wednesday was one of the last warm days before the cold front hits central Florida. I decided it would be cool to spend the whole day fishing while it's still warm. Thankfully it was an especially early release day at my sons' school too, which is getting ready for their 2-week winter break. So at 1 o'clock I picked him up and went home to get everything loaded up. After a short errand to UPS Store and backtrack to the house because my son forgot his DS....lol....we finially made it out to 38 Live Bait around 3:30. I got some fiddlers and shrimp then headed to the north causeway. I started with fiddlers, no bites. Used some live shrimp, then Cody and I caught a stingray back to back. That was it. A good hour passed with no bites, even on live shrimp. While out there I snagged a seahorse while checking my bait. It was tangled in some seaweed on my hook. Don't worry the seahorse wasn't harmed or poked. Cody was especially excited to see his first seahorse. I let him use the net to put it back in the water.







With the slow bite during the daytime trip, I still had alot of live shrimp and fiddlers leftover. Invited my friend Zack to fish the Flat Bridge after I got Cody to bed. The action out there was a little better. Immediately jigged with gulp swimming mullet and caught small blues like crazy. I had 3 on the bridge in no time. After the third one, my live shrimp rod gets a bite and it's a nice sized whiting. In the cooler it went. Waiting awhile for another bite. Zack jigged with his gulp swimming mullet, and caught a small 12" flounder, barely legal! In the cooler. LOL
Bite slowed again after that, couldn't even get the small blues to bite. Left there with 2 fish in the cooler. Hey I'll take what I can get at this point.

12" Flounder at South Causeway

Started in New Smyrna this morning around 6am. First stop was the South Causeway in where my old friend Dave was already setup on the dock. Dave is the guy I learned all about shad fishing on the St Johns river. It was a very foggy morning but as the sun came up the fog lifted pretty quick. I targeted the shallow area next to the parking lot with a Gulp new penny shrimp. First cast, I landed a 12" flounder!



Nothing else the rest of the day LOL. We moved around to different spots, even tried Sleepy Hollow without any luck. By the way, Sleepy Hollow is infested with ticks. After walking through the woods I checked our cloths, found 1 tick on my pants and 2 ticks on my sons' cloths. Gross!

Finished off our trip by going back to the South Causeway to see how Dave was doing. He was fishing with mussels for sheepshead, I swear it looked like a big booger on his hook. He said he caught 3 big sheeps though, with alot of small ones thrown back. I bought a couple dozen fiddler crabs to try my luck at this, but only caught 2 mangrove snappers. I think I got there too late cause the current was ripping so fast. Dave said when the tide starts going slack, thats when the sheepshead will come in to feed. So with that said, I will just have to try again next week. :)

New Smyrna - North/South Causeways Update

Last night was my first trip to New Smyrna since about November. My buddy Kyle rode with me, and unfortunately there wasn't anything to really talk about. To be honest, it was a complete waste of gas to get out there. We should've went catfishing instead. Doh!


First of all, the South Causeway area is under construction. With the pier lights disconnected it's pitch dark at night. The whole entire seawall dock is fenced off as well and says no trespassing. The only good thing to note is the actual pier under the bridge is still open to fish during daylight I believe. But since the lights are out, it's a definite no go at night. Hard to tell how long construction will last too. Not a good start to our trip...

So it was off to the North Causeway pier, and upon entering the parking lot things started looking up. The parking lot was empty and the pier lights were on, we had the whole place to ourselves. So we unloaded our gear and walked out, saw a bunch of needlefish in the water but absolutely NO MULLET. The fall bait run is over, I understand this, but usually you can find a few schools at night near the pier lights. My guess is the upcoming cold front has pushed them into deeper water so you just couldn't see them. With that said, we didn't fish much. The only thing I caught with my castnet was a small threadfin herring. Located a few big mullet, but they were just too deep and fast to castnet. I tried multiple times and came up with nothing. So that was our night. I'm going to wait until at least mid-February and try again when it warms up a little. For now, I'll just focus on the Shad & Crappie Derby and doing a little catfishing here and there. In fact this weekend I have a Crappie Rally to attend, these are the same derby events I attended last year with the raffle prizes. I'll let you know how it goes!

NSB Causeways Report - (3) Gafftopsail Catfish

I checked out the South Causeway pier first, but the good spots were already preoccupied. Instead of fishing I spent some time throwing the castnet and mingling. Once I had enough finger mullet, I headed to the North Causeway to scout a fishing spot. Good news, the pier lights are back on at the north bridge! Woo hoo! The finger mullet were more plentiful and I actually had a great fishing spot available. So I setup my 10' surf rod and casted out a live finger mullet on a 1/0 hook. I casted out as far as I could, set the drag, and waited. It wasn't too long when I saw something hit the line and reeled in a big Gafftopsail Catfish, I call them "sail cats" for short. Casted out again and caught another sail cat. One more time.... casted out....sail cat. Gee, I wonder what will happen next? All together I caught 3 sail cats on live mullet, two of them were over 4 LB and put up a nice fight. The biggest one was a personal best 4 LB 8 OZ! Packed up and ended up taking home about 20 mullet for the freezer.

Location: North Causeway, NSB
Tackle: 1/0 Owners Light Mutu hook on fish finder rig - 4 oz pyramid sinker

Species: Gafftopsail Catfish
Weight: 4 LB 8 OZ
Bait: live finger mullet

NSB South Causeway - Mantis Shrimp Introduction

Well the pier lights are still out on the North Causeway in NSB. It's been about two weeks now so I wish someone would take care of it, but thats Volusia County. They probably can't afford the light bulbs or something.

So here I was at the South Causeway. Surprisingly only a few cars in the parking lot, so it was actually fishable this time. First things first, had to find some bait. Only problem was they were too big. All I could see were schools of big "smoker" mullet. They still work for catfish since you can just fillet the meat off of them, but I like the smaller finger mullet so I can use the gut section on my hook. With finger mullet in scarce quantities, I decided to keep my castnet ready in my hands so I didn't even get a line wet last night. Besides my main mission was to net some mullet for catfishing.

When I walked up to the pier I noticed a couple with their kids, they weren't fishing either. Instead they were looking for mantis shrimp. Whats a Mantis Shrimp? Is it a mantis or a shrimp? Well in fact, it's neither. It gets it's name by the physical resemblance to both the praying mantis and the shrimp. The nice couple explained why they had them, apparently it's great redfish bait. In fact, the guy said it was like redfish candy. He's caught big 30-40" reds on them apparently. One thing they stressed over and over was to never handle them carelessly or with bare hands. They can inflict severe cuts and gashes if handled improperly.

I proceeded to look for finger mullet then came across some Mantis Shrimp floating down current. Maybe a minute later I saw another one. Then awhile later I found another one. After the third one, I didn't see anymore. The biggest one was about 9" long! Once you get a close look at these marine creatures it's just fascinating. Makes you wonder how tough a Redfish's stomach is to withstand such brutal defense weapons. Mantis shrimp sport powerful claws that they use to attack and kill prey by spearing, stunning or dismemberment. And although it happens rarely, some larger species of mantis shrimp are capable of breaking through aquarium glass. Whoa.

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.

Lights Out at North Causeway NSB

Tried my luck again last night at the North Causeway but upon arrival I saw the pier lights were out. Fortunately the bridge lights were on and bright enough to see what I'm doing at least. My first task was to castnet some bait but because the pier lights were out, it was hard to see anything. So I made a quick trip to the South bridge and in literally one cast, I had at least 25 finger mullet.

So back to the North bridge and since I was the only one there, it was nice to have the freedom to cast anywhere. Tried some cut ladyfish and caught a small hardhead catfish. I had two other rods rigged with live finger mullet next to the bridge. Only had a couple hits on live mullet, the first hit was a slow tug on the rod and when I checked my bait the mullet was bit in half. My first thought...bluefish. They always do that! The second hit was hooked and had some fun reeling it in. It was a 2-3 lb sail catfish. For a catfish, the sail cat is pretty good at making some runs and getting your heart racing. Its a fun fish to catch, and according to some people, it's good to eat. I haven't tried yet, I'll stick to channel catfish for now. :0)

CNS and North Causeway Report for Saturday

Tried fishing at CNS during the early afternoon but the waves were rough and current was moving. I couldn't keep lines in the water for more than a minute without it drifting to my right. So, I didn't fish much on the surf today. Cody and I just played in the water and had some fun. Cody was having a blast on a boogie board that a couple of locals let him borrow. I met these guys before and they're really nice. Angela and Keith are their names, and they come out on Saturdays often like I do. We're probably going to meet out there next weekend as well, they said they have a smaller boogie board that they're going to give Cody. Very nice!

So Saturday night I went to Kyle and Tara's house, and we went to Walmart to get them a bigger rod. They ended up buying a new 8' rod and reel combo for $30, not bad! Except the reel may end up getting replaced with something else one day. Here's why....
We went to the North Causeway together and Tara hooked into something big and strong. She was using live finger mullet and as soon as the fish hit it, it didn't stop. Her drag was racing and started to head towards the bridge. If it wraps around the bridge, the fish is gone along with several yards of her line. So we had to do something, but the reel's drag wouldn't stop the fish. Her drag was set as tight as it would go, and the fish was still spooling line off. Kyle tried to turn the fish around away from the bridge, but I saw a splash on topwater then snap the line broke. We don't know what it was but it broke 65 lb test Power Pro. Unfortunately, I think the reel may have been the weak link in the fight. If it had a better drag system, the outcome could've turned out differently. These days, you get what you pay for and on a $30 rod & reel combo, thats exactly what happened.

During our stay at the North bridge I caught a couple catfish on fresh cut mullet. My first one was a 2 lb 12 oz Gafftopsail Catfish. Thats the biggest sail cat I've caught so far btw. I ended the night with a small Hardhead Catfish. Schools of mullet are everywhere now that the Fall migration is underway. I think as the month progresses we'll see even more schools of baitfish, especially mullet.

Location: North Causeway, New Smyrna Beach
Tackle: 5/0 circle hook on carolina rig - 4 oz pyramid sinker

Species: Gafftopsail Catfish
Weight: 2 LB 12 OZ
Bait: fresh cut mullet

4 FT 36 LB Redfish caught at NSB North Causeway!!

Last night I drove out to the North Causeway with Kyle for some night fishing. We arrived after midnight and baitfish were everywhere. We had live mullet in no time and were ready to fish. Nothing caught on live bait the whole night though. Fresh cut mullet was the ticket, my first catch was a nice 1-2lb Sail Catfish. Then it was after 2:00AM when I hooked into something big. At first it felt like it was a stingray. It made long drag racing runs and a couple times it felt like it was suctioned to the bottom similar to what a stingray does. You think your snagged but it's really the suction the stingray creates as it can hug the bottom. Anyway, I was watching this fish spool line off my reel like it was nothing. I was trying to get a good drag set tight but not too tight that it would snag my line. At first I was thinking I had 40 lb test leader so I was being careful with tension but then I remembered Kyle hooked me up with 60 lb test leader, so I thought lets try to muscle this bad mama jama in. Set my drag a little tighter, and started gaining ground on it.

The fish was about 30 feet from the pier when it barely surfaced the water for a second and I saw the first image of what's on the hook. I couldn't see much, all I could see was a long fish-like shape so it definitly wasn't a stingray. The visual only lasted a second too. As soon as I saw it, it went back down dragging several yards of line with it. All I could do was hang on to the pole and wait for it to stop.

So I'm muscling it back up to the surface and we got a visual again as it almost surfaced again next to the pier. Then my buddy Kyle calls out, "It's a shark!". I started to get all excited because I've never caught a shark before, it's been one of my missions this year. The fish gave a last effort to swim away again but by this time it was worn down and tired. It stayed close, but we still didn't know for sure what kind of fish it was. I maneuvered it closer to the pier and finially got a good look at it's head. This is when I realized it wasn't a shark, it was an oversized MONSTER Redfish! Never have I seen a fish this size before, and I didn't even know Redfish get that big. It took both of us to get it up and dehooked for a quick release. I did my best to get good pictures but I was full of adrenaline and excitement. So I apologize if my pictures seem somewhat blurry.

The fight was intense and lasted for about 10-15 minutes. And best of all, I caught the bull on my new 10' Okuma Tundra surf rod paired with a new Okuma ABF-65 reel. I have 300 yards of power pro on this reel too, so I wasn't worried about being spooled during the long runs. I can also thank Kyle for lending me the 60 LB test leader line. Kyle actually tried this rod earlier but accidently lost the rig on a snag. Being the good guy he is, he wanted to fix the mistake by rigging up my pole with some of his tackle to make up for it. He had some stronger 60 LB test leader compared to my 40 LB, which probably was the difference in catching the bull red. It's the biggest fish I've caught so far, and probably the biggest redfish I'll ever catch. Have you ever caught a 4 foot Redfish before? It's totally exhilerating!! =)

Location: North Causeway, New Smyrna Beach
Tackle: 5/0 circle hook on carolina rig - 4 oz pyramid sinker
40 LB test Hi-Viz Yellow Power Pro braided mainline
60 LB test Berkley Big Game mono leader

Species: Redfish
Weight: 36 LB - 48" long
Bait: fresh cut mullet







I understand it's hard to see the actual size of my redfish with the pictures above so here's an example of what a 35 LB Redfish looks like being held by a fisherman. So the following picture is not my fish nor my picture, it's just an example to show size and girth.

MAN HOLDING 35 LB REDFISH

N.S. South Causeway Report - Shrimpin'

Setup with Kyle at the South Causeway pier in NSB around 11:30pm. It was the tail end of the outgoing tide with just a few hours before slack tide. Started by jigging a Gulp! Shrimp on a 1/8oz jighead but didn't get any bites. Kyle almost had one but it popped off. I brought some frozen shrimp and started catching small stingrays and catfish in every cast. Thats all that was biting though. Also as it turns out I didn't see any baitfish at all the whole night, however, it was low tide so it's not that surprising.

Was getting bored with the stingrays and catfish so I threw my castnet out in the shallow area and caught alot of small shrimp. Then waited until slack tide and noticed the shrimp running under the pier lights now. Caught about a dozen medium sized shrimp by blind casting where the lights shine the brightest on the water. Actually came home with quite a few shrimp to freeze. I didn't count them but I'd guess about 30-35 shrimp all together. Mostly small size shrimp, then about a dozen medium shrimp. Might head out to Canaveral Seashore later this week, depending on the surf. There's 6 ft swells today due to Hurricane Katia out in the Atlantic.

New Smyrna Morning Bite - Bluefish / Butterfly Ray

Me and Kyle planned to fish the morning bite at New Smyrna so we arrived a few hours before first light. Our 1st priority was to get some baitfish so we spotted some schools of finger mullet. Most of the mullet we caught were about 3" long, perfect finger size. Kyle caught a few bigger mullet and I netted 2 live shrimp when the current slowed down. We fished our usual spot at the end of the pier and waited for morning. When morning came, we waited some more. The bites were not coming as we had hoped. No crevalle jacks, no redfish, no drag singing bites. I did get a Bluefish up on the dock and Kyle caught a Butterfly Ray, but that was it. Well, another day another outcome hopefully. Thats the way fishing is, one day your on top of a feeding frenzy and the next day your wondering if there's any fish at all.

1st Spotted Seatrout - 23.5" - 5 lb 10 oz

This morning around 7:30am I caught a monster 5 lb 10 oz Spotted Seatrout from the South Causeway using a live croaker on a 3/0 Owners Mutu Light circle hook. To my surprise there were no jacks biting at all...or bluefish for that matter. I finially got a good bite but nothing after the initial hit, so I figured it had either killed my bait or took it off my hook. Curious to check my line, I started to reel in but this trout must have been watching. After a few turns of my reel it slammed it as I was reeling up, and it was fish on baby! It didn't take long to wear itself down but I also had to figure out a way to get it up without breaking my line. The pier is a good 10-15 feet above the water, so line lifting will risk losing the fish. Plus I don't have a landing net that will reach that far below me. Fortunately there's a seawall near the front of the pier where my 4-5 foot dip net will reach, and safely scoop this fish out of the water. I just had to carefully move the fish down there as I'm holding my rod and keeping the fish in the water. Everything worked out well and we got it out. I'm glad Jevin was there to help me out, otherwise I don't know what I would've done. This is my first spotted seatrout catch, and a damn good one. It's sitting in the cooler on ice right now waiting to be cleaned for dinner. Here in Florida, the size regulations for the Spotted Seatrout is 15" to 20" with a bag limit of 4. However, you are allowed to keep (1) over 20" long. Mine was 23.5" long.

Location: South Causeway, New Smyrna Beach
Tackle: Owners Light Mutu 3/0 hook on carolina rig - 3 oz sinker

Species: Spotted Seatrout
Weight: 5 LB 10 OZ
Bait: live croaker

From Freshwater to Saltwater - Crevalle Jack / Sand Trout

Last night Kyle talked about fishing the Mullet Lake river bank again, and I haven't been there in about 6 weeks. I'm always down to fish, so we prepped our rods for freshwater and got our gear in my car to do some night bank fishing. I had the rod holders, my Coleman eletric lantern, headlamp, frozen mullet and cut shad, big hooks, everything we needed to catch some monster cats. But as soon as we started walking through the grasses to even get to the bank, we noticed the terrain was swampy and flooded with all the rainfall lately. It's the rainy season in Florida afterall, so unless there's a generous dry spell I don't foresee the bank being a good idea anytime soon. Alot of big spiders too, now I'm not a wuss when it comes to bugs but I don't do spiders. The water looked like it was ankle deep in some places as well, so we turned around and the bank fishing that night was a bust before it even started. Damn!

Determined to fish somewhere, we convinced each other to just goto New Smyrna. The high tide would be in our favor so the baitfish should be plentiful. At the time we weren't planning to stay all night either but hey, nobody says fishing is predictable. We caught what we need for bait, including nice small mullet and croakers. I figured with all the bait we had, we should use it to our advantage for a morning bite. I felt confident the bluefish and crevalle jacks would bite, especially with live mullet. The only problem was the outgoing tide was extremely strong in the morning. So strong it was dragging 3oz and 4oz pyramid sinkers. Plus fish don't even bite well when the tide is moving so fast. It was a slow morning. I was hoping the current would slow down in time for sunrise but it didn't. I still managed to catch one Crevalle Jack and then later in the morning I caught a trout. I believe this one is a Sand Trout, which is not regulated in Florida. It was over 15" long and weighed 1 lb 6 oz. This is a new species for me to catch :)

Location: South Causeway, New Smyrna Beach
Tackle: Owners Light Mutu 6/0 hook on carolina rig - 3 oz sinker

Species: Sand Trout
Weight: 1 LB 6 OZ
Bait: live croaker or mullet

Good Morning Jack Crevalle!

I was bored, very bored, so I again set out to NSB for the early bite. I got there around midnight hoping to castnet some mullet for the morning. Unfortunately, getting live bait was a difficult throughout the night, particularly live mullet. Herring were plentiful, but no croakers, spots or mullet. We finially netted about 8 mullet right before first light. These live mullet would prove to be the difference between catching fish and just fishing as the morning progressed.

It was probably around 6:30am when I got the first bite. It was a Jack Crevalle that was slightly under 4 LB and it put up a hell of a fight. Bring your "A" Game on these guys, Jack Crevalles have alot of fighting power. All together I got (3) Crevalle Jacks on the dock, all between 3-4 LB each. The biggest one weighed an even 4 LB. Live mullet was very productive today, even the bigger 6" plus size mullet were no problem for the jacks to gobble up. Big Gene was using the live herring and not even a bite. I've noticed the jacks do prefer the mullet over herring when it comes to bottom fishing with live bait. Here's a picture of my very first Crevalle Jack!

14" Bluefish @ NSB

Fished the sunrise this morning at NSB and got alot of hits from blues. It was the smaller blues this time and they were biting the mullet in half leaving me with a fish head. I did manage to catch the 14" bluefish below. Kyle got himself a nice Crevalle Jack too.



Also here's a 20" Spotted Seatrout that was caught and donated to me. I think it was caught on a live spot.

South Causeway NSB - Whiting, Bluefish, Jacks, Tarpon

Last night at NSB was full of surprises throughout the night. I arrived at 9:00PM and Kyle/Tara came about 10:30 in the evening. I purchased 50 small shrimp from the bait shop and started out with 2/0 Kahle hooks. Not long after Kyle and Tara came out is when I caught my first Whiting! It was small but still a keeper. While I left to get some ice and drinks, Tara caught a small stingray and another kid caught a bigger whiting. Understanding that whiting usually travel in schools, I switched to a dual hook dropper loop rig and downsized my hooks. Now I was using two #2 Owners Mutu Light circle hooks with small pieces of fresh dead shrimp. I caught croaker, pinfish, and finially another whiting that was similar size to the other one I caught. Here's the two Whiting I caught...



Then around 1 AM we were there to witness someone catch a Tarpon very close to the pier. It put on a display of splashing jumps and vigorous head shaking as they grabbed the dropnet which helps raise fish from high piers. As soon as they got it up, they had to quickly dehook it and let it go. These tarpon don't fare well out of the water so they were in a hurry to get it back ASAP. Not only that, it's illegal to possess or harvest tarpon without a permit which runs about $50. Here's Big Gene holding the tarpon a few seconds before it's release...



Me and Kyle stuck it out all night at the pier. We were curious to see what the first morning bite would bring. Big Gene was telling us about the exploding jacks and blues running early in the morning around sunrise, so we wanted to get in on the action. He hooked us up with some tips and got our lines ready. The breakfast menu was live mullet and pinfish fished on the bottom. Just after 6:30am it started, and for about 20 minutes the fishing was INSANE! Gene pulled in 3 Crevalle Jacks and 1 Bluefish. I landed 2 Bluefish, one of which was the biggest one at 21" long! The 21" blue is my personal best too. Kyle hooked up with a fish but it ran over to the pilings and broke his line. He got to feel the big strong pull though and said it almost took his rod in the water. The long stay at the pier was exhuasting but I'd say it was worth it. We saw whiting, small catfish, small stingrays, tarpon, some bluefish, and crevalle jacks.

1st Bluefish @ South Causeway

Another night at the South Causeway, but first I made it out to 38 Live Bait before they closed to get some live shrimp. I picked up 2 dozen medium shrimp for $5 and headed to the pier. The first corner of the pier was crowded this time so I walked to the backend. Started out using shrimp but eventually caught some live spots and pinfish with my castnet. I've had better luck using a live spot hooked through the tail on a 4/0 circle hook. Around 2:00am I had a runner, my baitfeeder was going off but when I grabbed the rod it was gone. Then again 2:30 in the morning my baitfeeder went off again, this time I caught a bluefish that was about 16" long. All this action came from the live spots. Spots must be a favorite of bluefish because another guy caught a bluefish after I did.