Happy Monday Spacefish!

I hope all is well, and that everyone came out of the storm okay! Continued prayers with those affected by Hurricane Milton, and Hurricane Helene. I got a chance to go fishing Saturday morning; it was a bit of an adventure finding a place to go, but once I got going – it was a good day of fishing!

Launch Spot

So when I left the house early on Saturday I was anticipating not being able to access and launch from my chosen spot; I wanted to go back to Long Point since my last trip resulted in losing a few large Snook; but they were closed. I assume this was due to flooding from the Hurricane. So I got back on A1A and went to Sebastian Inlet State Park; my plan B was to launch from the kayak/canoe launch and head south to go fish the mangroves, and eventually the line of docks along the eastern shore of the Indian River Lagoon – but the State Park’s gate was shut and locked – not sure if they opened later in the day or not.

So that brought me to plan C! I continued south of A1A and took a right on the Wabasso Causeway and ended up launching from the shoreline of the causeway park. I am hyperlinking the address to the causeway park Boat Ramp but just know that I launched from the northside and started my journey heading north towards the tip of Marsh Island and the Pelican Island National Wildlife Refuge.

Where I Fished

So I ended up covering a good bit of ground on this trip. I went around Marsh Island and back towards the Causeway. I fished around the bridge pilings and caught a few small Mangrove Snapper, and a rare Sheepshead on artificial. Then I went north and fished the deeper ends of the docks and caught 2 small Reds and 3 small Trout.

I pushed north into the Refuge hoping to find some Snook; but this was a bust due to high water levels making skip casting to the mangroves impossible. So I tracked back towards the tip of Marsh Island. By this point the breeze had picked up and was coming from the east. So I did a few trips of starting on the NE point of Marsh Island and letting the wind and current push me around the tip, then I’d fish the wind protected side for a hundred yards or so and then go back and start it over again.

This was my most productive area on this trip. I caught Jacks and Sea Trout around the point, and caught two nice Redfish on the flats on the wind protected side. One I sight casted to, the water levels on this flat were up, but I was able to see the fish’s wake.

Don’t Go to Battle without your Minutemen

The quantity of this trip came on a shrimp lure, which I will discuss below – but the quality came from the Fish, or Die Minutemen in Independence (Pearl White). I rigged it on a Gold Z-Man Trout Eye Jig Head in 3/16 oz. I casted the bait upcurrent, near structure and slowly retrieved it by bouncing the bait off the bottom or dragging it along the bottom. The water temp felt chilly, with all of the rain from the storm, and that post storm cold front the bait and the predator fish were moving slowly, so taking that paddle tail and making it act cold and sluggish seemed to be the ticket, along with bottom bouncing a Shrimp lure.

All Hail the Vudu Shrimp

Most of the fish on this trip were caught on the Vudu Shrimp – I threw a colorway called Blue Moon/Chartreuse. This one lure caught Mangrove Snapper, Sheepshead, Sea Trout, Redfish, Jack Crevalle, and thanks to a generous amount of Pro-Cure I kept slathering on – the dreaded Saltwater Catfish. I have to say I was so impressed with this lure, they come 2 per pack for roughly $7 bucks at Strike Zone, and they are extremely tough, durable, and very lifelike in profile! This bait with Pro-Cure is about like fishing live shrimp in terms of the high number of bites it generates for me. I am officially a practitioner of “Vudu”!

Conclusion

So let’s analyze the post Hurricane landscape. The water levels are up, and the water is dirty, I imagine from here through early Winter the water levels will gradually decrease, and get cleaned up again – but as you go out, I think anything presented with Chartreuse or Gold on the tip of the bait, and on the jighead, and the use of scent enhancement from Pro-Cure or Dr. Juice will definitely increase your chance as long as the water is brown and tea-colored like it was this weekend.

I also kicked myself for not having a weedless hook with a Gold underpin blade on me, as I feel like the extra flash and vibration would have helped me to cover water and power fish. Also Strike King sells something called Redfish Magic, which is a Gold Spinnerbait and Z-Man sells Chatterbait Jig Heads, that or a good old fashioned Gold Spoon would probably kill it in this dirty water.

Regardless, it is nice to be in the fall season where the fishing is good through the late morning, and early afternoons! Thank you for taking the time to read this report, and make sure to check out Kayaks By Bo either in store in Cocoa, or online at https://kayaksbybo.com/ – stay safe, be happy, and catch fish this week! Until next time!

Happy Monday Spacefish!

I hope everyone is doing well on this 7th day of October in the year 2024. We have a big storm bearing down on us, and the weather yesterday was unpleasant to say the least; I had to chaperone our MCC homecoming dance Saturday, and with the weather bing cruddy I was not able to get out this weekend, but I was able to squeeze in a brief solo trip last Sunday. I wanted to do a solo follow up to Long Point, after writing about my father-son trip there.

It wasn’t a great trip for me personally, I’ll go into the details below. But don’t let that dissuade you from going – the area I fished was loaded with bait, I hooked up with two large Snooks and lost; and was under a time constraint due to having an open house at the school that afternoon.

As good as the summer is to me when it comes to fishing; the fall is brutal on me – getting back into the swing of the school year as a member of the faculty combined with football season and I am on the back foot when it comes to fishing sometimes – but hey that is life, and for all of us that aren’t full time professionals; that is the way it is.

For what it’s worth, football is going really well for yours truly at the moment – your MCC Hustlers are currently 5-1, we’re on a 3 game winning streak that has seen us score 131 points over the past 3 games (I guess I get to keep my job for the time being haha), and we’re currently ranked #6 in the state in our classification, and my QB, Brogan McNab leads the state in total TD’s with 20 combined passing, and rushing TD’s in 6 games. He’s also a pretty bad @$$ angler too; once the season is over I’ll go fishing with him and turn it into a report, and who knows, maybe Kayaks By Bo will get him signed on to an NIL deal now that it’s become legal in HS sports.

That’s enough football talk for this week, let’s dive into the report!

Solo Fishing at Long Point

So on this trip, I launched from the same spot I mentioned last week when I was fishing with my boys. I launched from the boat ramp at Long Point Park and immediately went north towards the area listed on google maps as the “mud hole” – which I have to admit, is not the most flattering of names for a fishing spot.

Pictured above are two areas that provided good action for me – unfortunately I lost two very quality Snook on this trip. The first of the morning I hooked up on topwater on the point just south of the island I circled. On the way back in, I lost what would have been a top 5 all time Snook for me. I was fishing a Vudu Shrimp in “natural” with a chartreuse tail. I was using a 30 pound leader, I thought I had her, but she went on a run back in the mangrove roots and I got tangled up and broke off.

I was able to manage a few smaller Snook throwing the Salt Strong Mulligan in the Lebronze color. I haven’t thrown this bait in a while; but with a bunch of Mullet in the area I was looking for a bigger profile soft plastic swimbait, that I could rig weedless and this was the biggest I had. It’s a great bait when you are looking to bomb something weedless across a flat, and it also skips really well under mangroves. It brings a lot of versatility to the table and is a fantastic bait for this time of year.

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Hurricane Milton

As I conclude this week’s report, I’d like to take a moment to acknowledge the potential harm that is heading our way in Hurricane Milton. I ask that you join me in extending our thoughts and prayers to all that live within the path of this storm, especially our friends on Florida’s Gulf Coast in the greater Tampa area.

After the damaging effects that Hurricane Helene had on the Big Bend and North Florida, as well as Georgia, Tennessee, and the Carolina’s I think we’re all ready for this season of tropical storms and hurricanes to be over. While we are not taking the direct hit over here on the Space Coast, I hope that everyone reading this will be kept safe from harms way. Hopefully we do not get much damage from the winds, and heavy rain.

Now would be a good time to pray for Florida, and the rest of the southeastern United States that have already been going through it. The prayer pictured above is what I will have my classes at Melbourne Central Catholic saying these next two days of school. Stay safe friends! Do not panic, but be prepared, and pray for others that may be getting it worse than us!

I hate to end on such a somber note, but that’s just the way life is sometimes. Stay safe, be happy, may your power stay on, and your homes be protected from storm damage. Until next time!