And just like that, they were gone. Well most of them, what a difference a day can make. Most people I know are not fond of Mondays, however, they are probably my favorite day of the week. Monday usually means that most people are going back to work and will not be on the water, so in my world, Mondays are a great day!
As with most of my Mondays, especially the ones around the full or new moon, they are reserved for my best clients, and today was no different. Rob and his crew had a great day with a warm south wind and a huge incoming tide, and when I got to the boat ramp in the morning there was not another trailer in sight.
I decided to make a short run south off of New Port Richey to a new area to catch bait, the flat I had been using saw a lot of pressure over the weekend. Once I got set up and started chumming it only took just a few minutes for the silver flashes to start to show, I was able to fill the well with two throws of the net and had the boat cleaned and ready to fish by 7:15. I was not meeting Rob until 8:30 at Nicks Park in Port Richey so I decided to do a little looking around to see if the fish had hung around through the weekend. I was pleasantly surprised to see fish on just about every point and rock bar I looked at, and bait was swimming on just about every flat.
I met the guys at the ramp right on time and we started our day, we had a tide change right at 8:30 so I decided to run to some deeper canals that would have moving water before the flats. We pulled up and the first 3 or 4 baits were inhaled pretty quickly but then it died off as the tide stopped. I knew once the water turned and started in it would fire up again, so we waited it out, and after about ten minutes the water was moving the opposite direction and the bite was on. One thing about these canals is the depth makes for a potpourri of fish, we caught fish for a solid hour Snook, Redfish, Speckled Trout, Mangrove Snapper, Jack Cravelle, and even a flounder or two.
The tide was starting to come in and the south wind was picking up to about 20 kts, I knew with the hard wind we were going to have a BIG tide, and I knew just where we needed to be. I made a run north to a great little spot near Hudson that has a creek with a deep corner that always is hot when the tide flows hard. We got set up and drifted the first baits down to the bend and it looked like bowling balls hitting the water, the Snook were very excited to see there lunch! We sat in that spot for the rest of the trip and caught Snook up to 35 inches two and three at a time, it was one of the best bites I’ve had all spring. We ended the day with lunch at Hooters in Port Richey and Rob securing his dates for the good moons in April and May.
I will say it was nice to be able to let the spots set up and get right to fish and not worry about racing to get there before some boat Invades it! This has been the best spring in a while for big Snook and with the cobia starting to show the next two months are going to be awesome!
Till tomorrow,
Capt. Greg DeVault
