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

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.

24 LB Stingray - South Causeway

Thursday night at South Causeway NSB I landed a huge stingray, but not before a drag pulling fight I'll never forget. As soon as it hit my live bait which was a Spot, the baitfeeder was singing. And even when I clicked off the baitfeeder, the main drag was still singing. It ran out several feet of line before I could even start pulling it in. I had to tighten the drag quite a bit, and start pulling up my rod and reeling in the slack as I let my rod down. It was heavy and I was going against the tide current, which didn't make it any easier. After about 8-10 minutes of pulling and reeling, finially got it up to the pier and saw it was a big stingray. I took it over to the wall next to the parking lot, where I could scoop it out with a landing net. It was weighed with the net, and the scale read 25 LB. The net weighs 1 LB 5 oz, so I figure the stingray was about 24 LB! I took a quick picture, though I was unable to get it turned over to get a top view of the ray. It was much easier to just leave it in the net so I could release it back. You definitly don't want to be careless while handling large rays. This ray didn't flop or whip it's tail at all, but that doesn't mean it won't happen. Always expect the unexpected. That night I had two more hooked, and they felt exactly like the big stingray. Though these two broke off my line during the fight.

Location: South Causeway, New Smyrna Beach
Tackle: Gamakatsu 6/0 octopus circle hook on a Carolina rig w/ 3 oz sinker

Species: Southern Stingray
Weight: approx 24 LB
Bait: live Spot