Fish Candy… Come and get it
Summer is here... I had a few hours mid day to go fishing... I heard reports that the whitebait has moved in to the Bayport area. Since the winds where calm I thought I would run over and check out Smith Rock. This is normally where it catch whitebait. When I got there, I saw nothing but a few ballyhoo. I did not want to make a day of whitebait hunting, so I decided just to head back to Centipede Bay and catch the ol standby, mud minnows. On the way across the Bayport channel I saw a few birds working and then saw the rain. When the whitebait are on the surface it looks like rain. I threw the net a couple of times and had plenty.
The report I got was the bait was small, just the right size for redfish. After the first cast, I could see they where all big, perfect for grouper bait. When I catch smaller baits I like to have about 100 or more, so I can live bait chum. Nothing gets the fish turned on like live chum.
My first stop was at the end of the bay, I call it the redfish super store. When I just need a quick fish for dinner, I'll stop by here. About 98% of the time there will be 3-5 redfish in the back. I usually fish 3 lines, the first in the back the other two on the front sides of this area. Funny thing about this area, this is the only place where I have had 3 redfish hit 3 line at the exact same time. Today only two lines went of with in 2 seconds of each other. Almost like the redfish were just sitting around looking at the bait, then something, triggers them to bite. I caught the fish at the top and lost the second. It's hard to fight two fish at the same time. I decided to hang out for another 10 minutes and caught two more. Then moved to a very rocky bay.
This is not really a rocky, it's one big rock, jagged, full of snags and very hard to fish. But the redfish, love it. Since I had one in the box for dinner, I decided to use up the rest of the bait and chum. I saw 3 fish at the entrance of this bay and a couple more swimming around. I tossed out the chum and the water came alive. I broke off 3 times and release 2 others.
Then it was time to head back to the office to wrap up the end of week market reports.
Good Luck
Zippyjr
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Tide : Top 3.3ft @ 1:54pm
Water Clarity : Very Clear
Moon Phase: 0% Full: New Moon
Temp: 83 F
Water Temp : 73 F
Wind: W 10mph
Results: 24 in Redfish 4 releases 1 jack
Bait: Whitebait aka fish candy aka Greenbacks.