The first of the week started out with promises of a good week. Highs in the low 80’s upper 70’s you know the way life is supposed to be here in Florida. I had some people scheduled for a trip on Monday but 
thunderstorms were in the forecast so we moved our trip to Tuesday. The plan was to meet at 7am grab some bait and head out offshore. The bait was a little tough to say the least but we finally got enough and headed out offshore around 10am. The winds were supposed to be out of the east coming NW by late afternoon. Don’t you know it as soon as we rounded the lighthouse, NW winds.
I remember back a long time ago an old commercial fisherman told me, “Son when ever you are in the gulf in winter and the wind switches NW, head home it’s gonna get bad.” We’ll we ran out a little anyway and it did get a little snotty to say the least. We hooked a few big fish and were unable to turn them. With conditions worsening we changed gears headed in our destination was O’Niell’s Marina to grab some shrimp. After gearing up for some light inshore action we looked for the large schools of drum that invaded the bay about 2 months ago but couldn’t find them, next let’s hit some trout. I had purchased 8 dozen shrimp and had two anglers using the Berkley Gulp Shrimp and two using live shrimp. In about an hour and a half we burnt through all our bait and had a limit of trout, speckled that is. The trout I had been catching were small on Tuesday we caught two small ones around 10-12 inches the rest were anywhere between 16 and 22 inches, and the action was non stop.
Talking with other Captains, the off shore is on fire when you can get there. The trout, black drum, and redfish are in the bay in abundance, just as we have another week of cold scheduled. The key is to pick your day. When conditions are right, the bite has never been stronger.
Be sure to catch us on TV Saturday mornings for The Reel Animals Fishing Show @ 6:30am on Channel 8 and listen to Captain Mike on 970 AM from 6-9am on Reel Animals Saturday’s with Captain Mike and Sunday’s 620 AM from 7-9AM for The Reel Animals Fishing Show and call in and give us your reports to win some cool fish gear. To book your trip visit www.reelanimalsfishingshow.com and until next week, “Do yourself a favor and take a kid fishin’.”
