# Where they are Biting (Central Fla.)



## Jigmaster (Apr 3, 2006)

SPORTS: News 





Where they're biting :fishing: 

Reds, sharks, snook bullying inlet bite

GOOD TO FAIR

Ponce Inlet area

The inlet is full of an "incredible" amount of redfish and sharks, said Ponce Inlet perennial guide Capt. Fred Robert.

"I have never caught so many big redfish and sharks at the inlet," he said. "On the last hour of the incoming tide there are a lot of snook biting in the jetty rocks and on the docks."


A few of the 80- to 100-pound tarpon are showing up, he said.

Capt. Robert suggested the best bait for all these big fish in the inlet has been fresh, live pogies and croakers.

Tim Adams reported he and his wife recently caught a pair of juvenile bonefish by Disappearing Island using shrimp. That makes three bonefish so far this summer that have been reported.

Surf & Piers

Ed Countryman at Ocean's Bait & Tackle said surf anglers have been finding the best fishing in the mornings, considering the heat and afternoon "thunder boomers."

Countryman said good numbers of whiting are being caught on dead shrimp and some nice-sized pompano were caught this week using sand fleas and clams for bait. A bucket full of big sheepshead was caught at the old Ormond Pier site, too, he said.

The presence of sand fleas in the sand at the water line has been here today gone tomorrow, he said.

Luke Zona at the Sunglow Pier said on Wednesday about eight reds to 26-inches were caught as well as a 27LB. flounder.<Now that was a Red Flag 27in...He said they started to see small schools of fingerling mullet on Thursday, but just a few. West wind started to decrease the visibility in the surf and that has slowed down the bite, he said.

At the Flagler Beach Pier Bait & Tackle, "Jake" said you can stand on the end of the pier and watch king mackerel jumping out of the water, the schools are so close in. They're right in big pods of either mullet or pogies, he said. On Thursday by 2 p.m., anglers had landed three kings, some sheepshead, a tarpon, drum, flounder and whiting, he said.

Halifax River

Ike Leary at Granada Pier Bait & Tackle said, "The shrimp run is still going thick. Everybody's shrimping. Nobody's fishing. It's the best run I've seen in years, buddy."

Leary said he hasn't heard about anybody catching a redfish in the river all week, but there are lots of trout showing themselves in the river right now. He said mum is the word on snook, too.

"If anybody is catching snook they're not talking about it. Of course, they're out of season," he said.

Tomoka Basin area

Countryman said, "Fair-sized mangrove snapper and some good flounder are being landed at the docks along John Anderson (Drive)."

Leary said there's some drum being caught at the bridge just north of the Tomoka State Park entrance. He said lots of trout are active and that on Thursday afternoon he saw some tarpon rolling near High Bridge.

Offshore> Deleted....we cant get there anyway. 

Mosquito Lagoon


Capt. Brian Clancy said a good trip right now is a dozen slot reds and an oversized bull. He said slot-sized reds are tailing early and he's throwing top waters. As the sun rises he's switching to soft-plastic jerk baits rigged weedless and then to 8-ounce jigs.

"After sunrise we've been looking for the schools of oversized reds. I'm fishing from Tiger Shoals up to Shipyard Channel. I've been finding fish there and haven't had to run south," he said.

As for the trout bite, Capt. Clancy said the guides who know how to use pig fish are killing the trout. And they're fishing more in the south end.

Indian River Lagoon






Capt. Bob Fisher said he's catching a lot of trout around the islands in the north end and that bite is lasting through late morning. The big reds are active early, he said. Capt. Fisher said his anglers have been catching two to five big reds and around 25 to 30 trout by starting at daybreak and fishing until around noon.

He said the big reds have been schooling and that there is a tremendous amount of bait hanging around just off the shorelines and that's what you have to look for.

Matanzas Inlet area

Capt. Chris Herrera said schools of pogies have started moving through in the last two weeks and they have a lot of tarpon on the hunt. He said he's been fishing the bait pods right behind the breakers on the beach or behind shrimp boats.

He said the pogie pods are far and few between, but the ones you do find are concentrated with tarpon running from 80 to 120 pounds.

"The flounder bite around St. Augustine has been amazing," he said. "Any where between 3 and 8 pounds is doable. It's all around the immediate area of the inlets. Look at docks, creeks mouths or around the jetty rocks at the inlets."

St. Johns River

Capt. Rick Rawlins at Highland Park Fish Camp said the artificial catch has improved on lakes Dexter and Woodruff and in the run. He said it took a 19-pound total of five bass to win a recent tournament and that the bite is by far the best early and late due to extreme afternoon heat.

In the Norris Dead River, again early and late, the bluegill bite on crickets is good enough to catch a limit, he said. And Capt. Rawlins noted that the water quality has been very good.

-- Jordan Kahn



Thought i would Post for those of you whom may not receive the Paper or live here.


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## emanuel (Apr 2, 2002)

Thanks for posting that. Just shows what I'm missing not being there. Go ahead and throw in the offshore for us anyways. I like to see what's going on and some of us do have access to boats.


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## jettypark28 (Jun 23, 2006)

*This should*

be good info for people heading into our area......"But" wheres is the Cape canaveral report?? There is no love for us 

"Jig" is there anyway you can check out, the sunglow report and see if that was a "typo" error on that 27lb flounder, they said they caught it there.....If it is correct....I would love to see that Picture....anyway thanks for the report 

Hopefully we will start catching more "Bonefish". Every year they seem to catch more and more in our intercoastal waterway....(belive it or not
I caught a little one in my castnet.....A long time ago) and i had to keep looking at it....cause i knew bonefish didnt get this far north.....i didnt have nothing to take a picture with.....but i turn him loose (little guy) and made a mental picture....It was a "Bonefish"
can you imagine hooking up to one of these "Rocket"  just like eveything else our mild winters, are bringing more and more fish up north....look how far north the "Snook" is being caught.......anyway let us know if you find anything out, on that 27lb flounder


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## KodiakZach (Mar 16, 2005)

a 27-lb flounder, at Sunglow !!!  

Wow!  I'll have to go check out the scoop on that tomorrow and see if it was true or not.


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## HellRhaY (Jul 6, 2007)

jettypark28 said:


> Hopefully we will start catching more "Bonefish". Every year they seem to catch more and more in our intercoastal waterway....(belive it or not
> I caught a little one in my castnet.....A long time ago) and i had to keep looking at it....cause i knew bonefish didnt get this far north.....i didnt have nothing to take a picture with.....but i turn him loose (little guy) and made a mental picture....It was a "Bonefish"
> can you imagine hooking up to one of these "Rocket"  just like eveything else our mild winters, are bringing more and more fish up north....look how far north the "Snook" is being caught.......anyway let us know if you find anything out, on that 27lb flounder


that's one more sign of global warming JP. we are getting as hot as "down south" that the fish came up here thinking it's still the "south".


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## barty b (Dec 31, 2004)

Like jetty said..27LB prolly was 27 INCH  I can believe the Bonefish thing..Hell, We are starting to see quite a bit of Snook being caught up here in JAX, That is not normal for us,it's friggin AWESOME,but not normal.


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## emanuel (Apr 2, 2002)

barty b said:


> Like jetty said..27LB prolly was 27 INCH  I can believe the Bonefish thing..Hell, We are starting to see quite a bit of Snook being caught up here in JAX, That is not normal for us,it's friggin AWESOME,but not normal.


Hey, I've heard of snook being caught as far north as Parris Island. The shop I used to work at in Savannah had pictures of snook that people would catch in their lagoons, so you know these fish had to have been born in the river, the fry managed to get up in those little salt lagoons and winter over. These weren't little dinks either, more like 5-10 pounds.


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## jettypark28 (Jun 23, 2006)

*good read*

July 13, 2007 

Florida's ghosts in the water 

By JORDAN KAHN 
FROM THE GULLET 

If a mystery can begin with the sound of a fish taking line off a reel, then what happened June 26 just inside the mouth of Ponce Inlet borders on supernatural.

It began innocently enough.

Todd Wynn of Ormond Beach and his wife were celebrating their third anniversary with a boat ride. They stopped at Disappearing Island. Wynn baited a rod with a dead shrimp and cast. . . Fish on.

"At first I thought it was a ladyfish, the way it was acting. It ran at me then turned around and started fighting a little bit, but it didn't jump," Wynn said. "Then I got a look at it and thought, 'What the hell is this thing doing here?'

"It blew my mind."

For all practical purposes, the fish Wynn held in his hands that day was a ghost. And not just because the fish Wynn caught was a bonefish, a game fish revered for it's near magical elusiveness as "the gray ghost of the flats."

The fact is, bonefish are not supposed to exist at all in Ponce Inlet, a 200-mile swim north of the frost-proof tropics conventional wisdom has established as this species' natural range.

And bonefish are schooling fish, especially as juveniles. So it's doubtful Wynn's bonefish was alone.

But what's stranger still is that scientists haven't been able to find big schools of juvenile bonefish anywhere.

INSIDE THE ENIGMA

The University of Miami's Bonefish and Tarpon Conservation Research program conducts annual fish count surveys, acoustic telemetry studies and, among other research, a bonefish tagging program that began in 1998.

As a result of this work, the population of bonefish in the Keys fishery is now estimated with relative certainty to number around 300,000. For an adult population of that size to be stable, Dr. Jerald Ault, the director of the research program, said a pool of some 10 million juveniles trying to survive to adulthood would be needed.

But they have never been able to find large numbers of juveniles, not even in the heart of their native habitat, the shallow grass flats and mangroves of Caribbean islands and the Keys.

"It's an enigma," said Dr. Ault. "There's not much known about where juvenile bonefish are."

This statistical incongruity is a recurring theme in bonefish studies, said Rich Paperno, a research administrator with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

"There are a lot of people who have looked for recruiting bonefish and been very unsuccessful," Paperno said.

RARE OR LOST?

Is it possible the undiscovered secret of these juvenile fish is that they fan out to the north to estuaries like Ponce Inlet and beyond?

"My intuition," Ault said, "is that the bulk of these fish are recruiting from the north of us (south Florida)."

It makes sense. Bonefish breed south of Marathon at a drop-off called the Florida Escarpment, where the ocean bottom plummets in forty degree slopes and near vertical cliffs. There, like dandelion seeds in the wind, bonefish begin a microscopic life adrift on the powerful northbound currents of the Gulf Stream.

And their larvae are found as far north as Virginia Beach, Dr. Ault said. As juveniles in northern climes, schooling bonefish will mix with pompano and feed on sandfleas, he said.

So it's not entirely implausible that these famously difficult to catch fish are undiscovered temporary residents of the entire coastal southeast, slowly maturing on their gradual journey south back to more ideal habitats.

It wouldn't be the first time limitations imposed on these fish by fishermen and scientists turned out to be wrong. Recent discoveries have shattered pervious theories about bonefish migrations.

ONE FAST FISH

Anglers have long prized bonefish for their speed. Named for their ample bones, the name also came to represent the threat that an angler's finger could get cut to the bone by accidentally grazing the buzz saw of fishing line racing off a reel when a bonefish is hooked.

But nobody suspected that speed was used for migration.

"When I started this program, I was told don't even bother trying to tag bonefish because we know they don't move," Ault said.

Scientists want data though, and since 1998 more than 4,000 bonefish have been tagged. Some fish moved barely a few miles. But some moved 50, 60 and 70 miles. And in 2006, a bonefish tagged near Key Biscayne was caught again 321 days later, 186 miles away at Andros Island in the Bahamas.

"That was totally unexpected," Ault said.

The implication was that not only do bonefish move great distances, they can cross the deep chasm of the Gulf Stream and could therefore mix with a Bahamas population of bonefish previously thought of as distinct and isolated from those in the Keys.

Bonefish tags have even revealed movements near 100 miles in just 10 days, Ault said.

Maybe they're just too fast and wary for census nets to catch.

Whatever the answer is to the mystery of juvenile bonefish, finding one in Ponce Inlet hundreds of miles from where it will likely live as an adult didn't surprise Ault.

And there's no debate that Wynn's catch was a one-in-a-million. The question is, how many one-in-a-millions are out there?

[email protected]

Tales of bonefish, permit in local waters

The 10-inch bonefish Todd Wynn found is not the only one that's been caught in local waters.

Capt. Chris Hererra of Palm Coast has pictures of a 4-inch bonefish he found mixed in with mullet in his cast net in the Intracoastal Waterway in Flagler Beach.

Capt. Hererra said Wynn's bonefish is the fourth one he's heard of being caught in area waters.

"I think they join the migrations of pogies or mullet or other baitfish," he said.

Gene Lytwyn, owner of the Fishin' Hole in Daytona Beach, said in the last 20 years he's heard of two bonefish caught here in the surf.

Rich Paperno, a research administrator with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, said net sampling studies find one or two bonefish in the Mosquito Lagoon each year.

And it is a bit of a secret that there are small numbers of bonefish and permit, another fish associated with the Keys, in the Banana River, an appendage of the Indian River that juts north into Cape Canaveral, said Capt. John Tarr, manager of The Flyfisherman tackle shop in Titusville.

"A lot of guys from the cape swear they're in the No-Motor Zone (of the Banana River) all the time," Capt. Tarr said.

Capt. Tarr has also heard of a school of 25 permit in the surf in New Smyrna Beach. And just about a month ago, Wynn, who works at the Fishin' Hole, said an angler caught an 18-pound permit in the river while sheepshead fishing.

Did You Know?

· Bonefish are one of the most coveted gamefish in the world. And in Florida, the University of Miami says recreational bonefishing has become a $1 billion a year industry.

· A $1 billion business angling for a population of just 300,000 bonefish in the Keys makes each of those fish worth $3,333.33.

· There are now 35,000 guided trips per year for bonefish in Florida.

· A typical bonefish charter is a three-day booking costing $200 to $425 per half day or around $600 per full day, depending on time of year and number of anglers.

SOURCE: Compiled by Jordan Kahn


I got this from the "Daytona Beach News-Jounalonline.com......i knew i wasnt crazy


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## barty b (Dec 31, 2004)

emanuel said:


> Hey, I've heard of snook being caught as far north as Parris Island. The shop I used to work at in Savannah had pictures of snook that people would catch in their lagoons, so you know these fish had to have been born in the river, the fry managed to get up in those little salt lagoons and winter over. These weren't little dinks either, more like 5-10 pounds.


 I believe it. I was talking to my uncle in Ponce about it once, He said that they wiil work thier way up here and stay if we have a mild winter, So it would make sence for them to be "native" to northern regions from being born there.
We have had them here for some time now,lots
of juviniles are caught around St.Aug. But here lately the bigger ones (upwards of 20-30") have been showing up rather regularly.
The St Johns river,being spring fed,and having many springs thoughout its length from Sanford, Is able to maintain a higher water temp throughout the winter. I would assume this would provide a comfortable environment for the Snook. There's probably more than we know of just due to the fact that nobody targets them up here.


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## The Crew (Jul 8, 2007)

*Jp*

Great Article! Thanks for putting that out there...but...I just find it hard to believe the gulf stream carries the larva north along the eastern seaboard and that the fish swim back to their natural habitat in the keys as they mature...reason...there would have to be more reported catches of bonefish north of the Keys.
What do you think?


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## jettypark28 (Jun 23, 2006)

*Look*

how far the eels swim.....as for reported catches, don't forget they are in a infant stage. People could have caught them, and thought they were something else. And these are "Scientists" doing these studys, and they cant figure it out....so we don't stand a chance trying to do ourselves You know they are putting alot of effort to know where this fish goes.....Look at the Money that fish brings in....but we are having alot of other fish slowly making thier way up north. If we get a freeze that last awhile, you will see alot of "Snook" floating around.....I remember that happening in the 70s.......And just because we don't see them, doesnt mean they arent there.....the one fish, that many don't want to belive are in some of our waterway....Bullshark  just wait till they catch a 6footer in the st. johns. i am going to try and load a picture of a 48inch (range) redfish, that was hit by a Large bull and only left 18inches of redfish....in the "Mosquito Lagoon" ...guy was fighting the fish, and in one bite....only thing left was 18in of fish....folks from the Department of Environmental Protection suggeted it was a female bull shark that just has her pups and was heading back out The fisherman said he might never wade fish again in there .....this story was in the fla sportman mag....i will try and load it. :fishing:


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## The Crew (Jul 8, 2007)

jettypark28 said:


> The fisherman said he might never wade fish again in there .....this story was in the fla sportman mag....i will try and load it. :fishing:


With all these Shark articles I've been reading recently with Sharks in rivers and creeks, I've decided to STAY OUT OF THE WATER!!! Unless its a pool!


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## jettypark28 (Jun 23, 2006)

*You*

better not watch "Shark Week" you won't even take a bath


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## KodiakZach (Mar 16, 2005)

And the answer is.....

One dude said 27 inch Flounder. However, another very reliable source (my buddy Harry) did say a Flounder was caught there last week that was too big to fit in a 5 gallon bucket.


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## The Crew (Jul 8, 2007)

*Kodiak*



KodiakZach said:


> And the answer is.....
> 
> One dude said 27 inch Flounder. However, another very reliable source (my buddy Harry) did say a Flounder was caught there last week that was too big to fit in a 5 gallon bucket.


I've seen several Flounder that barely fit in a five gallon bucket caught at the new Jax Pier. Its a quality pier if you know where and when to fish it. I've seen everything caught there from Tarpon and Sharks on down to bait, with the exception of Snook or Bonefish.


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