# Cape Canaveral Sub Turning Basin report



## cpn_aaron (Apr 11, 2006)

Father-in-law works on the Delta 4 rockets, so he gets the passes for the beaches and sub pins around the cape. He asked me about 2 days ago if I was in for a morning of fishing at the Trident Sub turning basin. I had to think about it for about 2 seconds, we were in like sin. After being closed for 2 weeks due to a sub, we were finally going to put the hurt on the place. We got there and with one other person had our lines in the water by 8:15 (earliest people are allowed to fish the basin). There were tons of those very small glass minnows everywhere and the jacks, spanish, and blues were trashing them all day. The guy next to us stayed until 10 AM using hand picked shrimp and he caught more jack than you could count, one EXTREMELY fat 10" lane snapper, 14" yellowtail snapper, and a skinny 12" flounder.
We had brought fresh dead shrimp and fresh clams. Unfortunatley the basin's water temps are still 4 degrees too warm for pomps, so the clam was pointless. We hooked up with jack upon jack but the blues and spanish were being very finicky, only eating the minnows. These guys were all locked on to small prey and only tiny bright yellow buckhair jigs could illicit feeding responses. No other color would even get them to follow the lure. All the jacks were caught on bucktails, save two who ate a shrimp on the retrieve up from the bottom. I got bored of jacks, and the blues and spanish wouldn't touch anything we threw at them, even fingerling mullet. So I started free lining whole dead shrimp along the pylons for the sheepies and snapper that lurk at each of the hundreds of pylons along this 1/4 mile warf. The result was more 14" salior's choice that were 2 inches thick than I could count. I have never seen those fish that big or thick. It makes me wish I brought my heaver and balloon float rigs. There were barracudas chasing our fish all day and that would have been a fun pull to hook into one of them.
In the end I managed one 11 1/2" yellowtail (too small) and a 10" FAT lane snapper who went free since I had no other worthy fish for the fillet board. The father-in-law slayed look downs (one was the size of a serving platter, just mind bogglingly huge) with a 1/8 oz flourescent green bucktail jig while I worked the snapper. We hoped with the schools of look downs out the pomps were nearby, but no go. Many times these fish school together, but not today.
We left at 12 to head home and hope to hit this spot again. Expect me to report from there as soon as the water hits 65 F. The pomps just cram in there and it's elbow to elbow fishing the basin's warf. You clean up a 2-3lb cherry picked limit in less than an hr leaving time to target the other great fish in there (snapper, snook, sheepies).
Sorry for the lack of pics. Anyone familiar with my posts knows I like to paste them everywhere, but my digital camera ate it last week. So for now I'm picless, ug.


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## VICIII (Apr 8, 2005)

Get report and thanks


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## BentHook (Dec 22, 2002)

Ill bet that basin holds a lot of flounder too.The pomps by-passed N.Fla this year.Some of the commerical boys tore them up in Nassau Sound for two days but nothing from Fernandina to Flagler Beach.They ought to be nice an fat by time ya'll get them.Now were getting under sized whiting and blue's.


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## jettypark28 (Jun 23, 2006)

*I have*

buddy that just got a job there so i can't wait, sending him something for Xmas just to make sure i am in the loop He call me and told me some story about what others have said to him. I think he took the job just because of the fishing there


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## BigJeff823 (Oct 14, 2002)

*Last time I was Fishing*

I was in that area but I was wading the muds in the Meritt Island refuge and Fishing Parrish Park.


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## BigJeff823 (Oct 14, 2002)

*I caught*

A 22" Red and lots of 11"Speckled Trout.All fish were caught on live Shrimp under a Popping Cork on light tackle.


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## cpn_aaron (Apr 11, 2006)

tomorrow morning we're hitting the place again looking for better hook ups. Winter flounder do back up in there on a sanbar near the warf, but the jacks were swallowing all the baitfish around that day making catching anything not a jack difficult.
This time we're going to try some live shrimp and hopefully grab some mud minnows to see if the flounder are out and about.
Jetty, the fishing places within the naval portion of the base are sweet. The only drawback to the basin is you are only allowed one rod in the water per person. So we bring 3 different rods rigged up with different rigs and lures so we can cycle through them quickly. So if a school of macks and jacks come by we would reel up the shrimp and toss the jigs. Makes it a little harder to throw out a bunch of rods with different baits to try your luck. You really have to just try and pick the right rig for the right time of day.


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