Gator Trout Build in the Skinny

Not much has changed since our last report. Winds relentlessly continue from the northeast. The skies continue in a chamber of commerce and blue bird way. Water temperatures are favorable and overall the fishing has been good for a variety of gamefish.

Snook are being typically funky with the strong high pressure and associated winds that have gone unchanged for some time now. One day there is nothing you can do wrong and the next several days they can be seen, but not caught. This is nothing new to those who fish the specie on a regular basis. The water temperature is right, the fish are present, and a little change in the weather pattern will get them going in this traditional peak of the fall season. We’ve had several days with fish up to 12 lbs. the past week, but for the most part there has been no rhyme or reason with a lack of change in the weather. Scattered reds (oversized), trout, mackerel, flounder and jacks can be expected and are being taken while fishing them on the outside. Inside the action has been more consistent, but is of an "all or nothing" type chance. Until we get another change in the winds, not traveling deep into the backcountry is time well conserved.

A favorite fall past time with me is to slip out at night. Areas that hold strong numbers of fall snook and that are unresponsive under blue skies, often become fools after dark. In fact, spots that seems null and void of anything by day, can be found teeming with trophy snook, redfish, trout , snapper, bluefish and tarpon under the cover of darkness. These trips often produce some of the most phenomenal flats fishing you have ever experienced.

Spanish mackerel are just about anywhere there is some tide flowing and bait present. There has been a few kings taken just outside the passes and along the beaches. Reports from the Panhandle state that the numbers there remain strong and indicate that despite the last (and only) cold front…it was not enough to send them all running to the south. High winds have kept most grouper diggers in port the past week.

Robert McCue