Sittin‘ on the hill this Friday morning as the first real cool front of the year slides in. The weather has been great (a little breezy maybe) with clear skies and temps in the upper 80’s for weeks now.
This front is supposed to drop the night time temps into the 50’s for a couple evenings but is bringing a stiff NW wind with it this AM keeping me from taking my scheduled folks fishing. Hard to have fun in 25-knot winds and a choppy sloppy Gulf! The good side is the Gulf water will start to cool down a little and turn the all ready hot King Bite on even more.
The first of the Fall Mahi showed up this past week and my son (William) got one of his clients a nice sailfish yesterday on a kayak fishing trip. The temperature change should have the surface trolling bite at it’s peak for the next month or so as well as starting the Flounders going on their annual Fall frenzy. I know it sounds silly for so many of us that are out chasing BIG fish everyday to get so excited about Flounder fishin’ but, it is still something I look forward to every year.
Meanwhile the bottom bite for Vermillions has stayed HOT the past couple weeks with plenty of Kings thrown in for excitement. Not many Grouper around right now it seems and we have had to work for keeper Red Snappers an the weekends. I was out of town this past weekend but the one before I think we caught more Red Snappers in one day than any week during the regular season. The problem was they were all 15 to 15 3/4 inches ! We still were able to get some good keepers but they were not as thick as next years.
here are a few pics from the past couple weeks to back up the stories….
Kings, Red Snappers and Vermillions, LOTS more in the box….
First time Father and Son trip. The junior angler caught (by far) most of the fish, dad wanted a big one and succeeded with that great Red Snapper after breaking off a couple others.
These guys are yearly regulars and always have a BIG time. They had a fine catch of fish on this morning 4 hr as well.
A breezy morning kept us up on the beach for these folks… with good success on the Kings!
Another yearly regular family trip. That youngest angler would rather fish than eat I think. He caught Kings by himself.
Another vacationing family with a nice catch of Kings and Vermillions.
One of my rare “single angler” trips… the rest of his family bailed on him but he was sure glad he came and had a blast.
A first time fishing family with a great catch that included 2 real nice Mahi.
Another family of first timers proud of part of a great morning catch. You just can’t do that in Chicago!
I should be back out by tomorrow afternoon at the latest. I am looking forward to the changing of the seasons and the fish. Also looking forward to just running one trip a day after the time change in a couple weeks!
For more great action Check out Captain Larry’s Fishing Column on SoWal.com.