I live in Port Charlotte, FL on a canal with access to the Myakka River near El Jobean, FL and Charlotte Harbor. I own a boat and I love to fish. I'm new to Florida so I'm learning a new kind of fishing and I thought a record of fish caught, weather, tides, etc. for each trip would help me to learn quicker. That record is what you'll find in my blog which I post as soon as I possibly can so check before you're going out, my success or failure might help make your trip more productive.
Fish Caught: Redfish, Lady Fish, Catfish, Skate/Ray
High Tide: 4:15 PM 1.2 FT Low Tide: 10:30 AM -0.2 FT Wind: 10-20 E Air Temp: 50/77 Water Temp: 68 Clarity: murky
Ran down to El Jobean Bait & Tackle Shop got some shrimp and we left the dock by about 11:30 AM. Down near the end of the Apollo canal I noticed a lot of action on the water in a deep trough were the water was rushing over a sand bar. It took me a half hour to find out it was a bunch of catfish, I've seen them breaking water like this before but its not too common.
I moved on to drift my shrimp under the docks with little result. I think I fed a few Mangrove Snapper but even they didn't seem hungry today. I did see a manatee come by but the water was so dark I could only see it's nose when it came up to breath even though it swam within 4 feet of our boat. As the water got a little deeper I moved over to an oyster bar, there's a channel that runs strong between two bars and sometimes the snook feed there.
No snook today but I did get a bunch more catfish and rays. I also got a few small redfish but only one reached the 18 inch minimum and I kept a couple ladyfish to put in my crab trap.The wind was very strange all afternoon. It would be calm when suddenly the palms on the west side of the canal would start rattling and a wall of wind would sweep across the canal blowing the boat into the tide on the anchor line.
It was during one of these revolutions that one of my rods started bending over. I though it was caught in the oysters and it was the motion of the boat pulling it over. But when I picked it up I felt some life on the other end of the line. I set the hook and realized I had something huge. It wasn't fighting like you'd expect from a snook or even a redfish. It just swam around a little while I tried to pull it towards the boat. I could feel it thrashing it's head but it was a slow powerful motion. I finally got it up to the boat and we started to see a shadow in the very dark water when the hook shot up and over our heads.
We'll never know what it was, it never surfaced or gave us a glimpse. It was about 4 o'clock when we ran out of shrimp and headed home, another exciting day on the water.
