Lemon Bay Specks & Spots

Laying it out...No Fish Tale Here!

Angling Lemon Bay, Englewood, Florida for Sea Trout (Specks) and Red-Drum, a.k.a. Redfish or Spots, is a real adventure, this time of year as we are in mid-spawn, so the Spots are extremely active whither following the pack, (females bunched and tailing alike a school of mullet), or hanging in the pots in wait for a meal. Catching Specks to Spots in the Slots is a real challenge, unless you know the secret; finding pristine flowing grasses, with spotted oyster beds with an outflow of nutrients, crabs, shrimp and water, moving towards the two openings, found here, in Lemon Bay, Florida, out to the Gulf of Mexico. Our catching of Lemon Bay Specks to Slots was a real treat to fish, as we wadded along and noticed the starfishes, sea urchins and even sea horses all across the fresh saltwater flat. The in to out flows of Stump Pass to the north and Boca Grande to the south make Lemon Bay one of the best areas to angle when in search of Specks to Slots for the table or in catch release.

 Wadding Lemon Bay

Redfish (Spots) is a member of the drum family, whose cousins include the Atlantic Croaker, spotted Seatrout (Specks), and black drum. As they say, birds of a feather, so it is natural these fish, hang together and feed much alike, making them the perfect target to fisherman looking to hook it up with two of Florida's top game-fish, without a endless search across a vast flat to estuary or bay; when you find one and more are to follow. Catching Specks to Spots is best and easiest for novice to pro alike to use live shrimp, finger mullet, dollar-crabs or small yellow-tailed Pinfish; either free-lined or under a slip to popping cork, to which I prefer the pencil-like snap float. The Popping cork is just that, a cork that sounds much like a feeding trout as it Plops the top of the water in its attack of prey. I personality believe it can do the opposite too, pop to much and spook the fish; so what is too much? I'll stick with a Cajan style cork myself; personal preference.
Best baits are:

• live medium to large shrimp
  
• finger mullet
  
• dollar crabs
  
• two to four inch yellow tailed pinfish
  
  
  
   23 inch Speck
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  “FISH ON!”
  The Mentoring Angler,
  Gary A Anderson

18 inch Speck

Spot with Spots; nice Slot limit Red!

Rat Reds to Ling on a Guess (Florida Cobia)

Red rat tides as the birds flew by, in search of a feisty fishy dinner, as we scooted around the point coming out of Gasparilla boat ramp, just this side of the causeway to Boca Grande. All through out Boca Grand Channel up through the old docks, great schools of scaled sardines, greenbacks to glass minnows boiled the greenish blue waters with a magnitude of birds dropping from above. Osprey, hawks, Bald Eagles, the Floridian Air Brigade ( Pelicans in dive bomb formation), all in picking meals to treats to eat; only thing missing was the big fish below, they either were on a diet or not there at all!

We tried shrimp under a cork and fed the cats. Switched to a soft jerk bait, in a creme color with an 1/16 ounce Eagle Claw worm hook, for giggles, cast it out and ever so lightly twitched it on the count of three on every drop and catching specks like bees to honey. All fell in the range of 14 to 14 1/2 inches but was a lot of fun. Just before dark, we decided, again to mix it up and threw out floating stick baits by Bass Pro, XLT series and trolled them behind the canoe on speed three of my Motor Guide, 30 pound thrust trolling motor, as the sun was beginning to get a bit lower in the sky and we had miles to go, to get back to the ramp, before dark.

Each time we chunked out the baits, they were slammed by Under-slot Reds in the 15 inch class. Edwin had two break-off, probably because he was angling without a leader and fishing light...six pound test, duh, but the fights to leaps were spectacularly expensive in loosing lures on almost every cast to a fish. I went back to my original set up only this time, I figured as long as we are playing with Bass lures, why not skip a 6 inch Zoom green lizard across the top as we needed to hook it up and get it in. Wham, bam, we saw the fish for a split second before it just about spooled my reel, as we turned in chase. This guy was swimming faster and in more direction than I could do, to keep up with it. As it took us in to the shallows, the props jammed up, rod bent and that really sweet Cobia just smiled to “POP” and swam away.

Think I'll try me some more lizards next time, I mean, maybe it looks like an eel to them Ling. I do not know but I know what I'm fishing with later this week; care to guess? “FISH ON!”