    
Capt. Jason Ramsey
Unregistered guest
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Votes: 1 | | Posted on Saturday, March 31, 2001 - 6:49 pm: | |
Subject: The Latest Action from www.fishtheflats.com
Sorry again about the wait!
Whether it’s been computer difficulties, or just plain long days on the water, either way it’s been faaaaaaar longer in between reports than I’ve ever gone before! This has nothing to do with the quality of the fishing I have to report on, but any way you look at it, I apologize to my faithful readers for making them wait so long.
Follow the bouncing ball…
The bouncing ball so to speak has been our water temperature. As I left you with my last report, we were off to a really early start relative to our tarpon season. Well that trend that started those last couple of days of February have continued right through March, but water temperatures have dictated just how hot the bite has been. If you are in the bay area and are fortunate enough to have calm winds and water temps of 70 degrees or better, doing the tarpon dance is just about a guaranteed thing right now! With the passing of several fronts in March the bite has varied dramatically as our water temps seem to drop very quickly into the mid sixties and the action on the big fish slows dramatically. Then, ever so slowly, the waters will once again warm and all of a sudden, it’ll seem like every bait that hits the water will get slammed! This is still early season, deep water fishing and not the sightcasting kind of stuff we’ll have in another month or so, but one of the best examples of how hot the bite can be right now had to be the action we had one morning during the second week of the month. I left the dock early as I usually do to get out and load up on bait before returning to town to pick-up my clients. My partner Capt. John departed Regatta Point marina in Palmetto with his clients at about 7:00 and I gave him a couple scoops of bait as we passed on my return to pick-up my customers at 8:00. He ran out to our favorite structure, anchored up, hooked a couple baits on his 8 foot G.Loomis spinning outfits and gave instruction to his clients on where the fish would likely be relative to the structure. Well, the instructions were accurate and on the second cast, the bait off the left side of his Hydra-Sports got inhaled by a big fish! So off to the races they went. I called to check in with him before my client’s arrival and he informed me of just how quickly their bite came and that they had just finished maneuvering back over to his anchor after the 45 minute battle and the photos of a lifetime.
Given the tarpon’s willingness to feed, we also decided that while I ran my clients out toward their location, John would head back and try to catch some more BIG tarpon sized baits for both of us. Unfortunately (well not really), catching some more big bait wasn’t in the cards for John and his anglers since the first bait they tossed after landing their first 100 plus pounder of the day, get slammed as well! Needless to say, John’s next call to me was the “sorry, but we can’t get to the bait right now ‘cause we’re hooked-up again” type of call. I said, “no problem” and asked “how long you going to be on that fish”? His response was that this fish was a bigger one and that he’d have at least another 30 minutes before this one would be boatside. “Good” I said, I’m going to borrow your anchor ‘til you’re done. Well, you probably guessed it by now, but the outcome was just about immediate as we hooked yet another big tarpon right from the same anchor in less than 10 minutes time! 3 fish in maybe 20 minutes of both boats sitting on the same exact spot. When the bite is on, the bite is on!
It’s not just tarpon either…
Sure, I’m an admitted tarpon addict, but fortunately, if your visit here puts you on the water during one of those cooler spells, or on a day too windy for fishing in the bigger part of the bay, that’s okay. Between the trout, cobia, jacks and most importantly the snook, chances are you aren’t going to have time to get bored around here. Our most popular fishing days right now usually involve doing the tarpon thing in the morning and then heading into the flats for an afternoon of snookin’, and it’s been working really well. In fact the day described above with the hot tarpon bite was a great example of this as well since the same anglers had the opportunity to land jacks, redfish, trout and snook all in addition to their triple digit tarpon. Anglers that want to focus their day on the flats action and forgo the aforementioned big game opportunities, or have been forced to do so, have been rewarded with some awesome action. Early in the month it was a couple of my friends from up at www.bighornoutdoors.com that were forced by wind to come up into the mangroves and videotape some snook action, and just yesterday it was Matt McIntee and company from up at Crown Golf that was limited to “just” snook fishing. In the end we got 3 tarpon on video with Tom and Todd from www.bighornoutdoors.com but we got a whole bunch of snook action on their camcorder as well. Yesterday on the other hand Matt and company must have done at least 35 or more snook. Like I said, just about everything that swims is really active in the spring of the year.
It’s not just on the flats either…
One notable day that I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention here, had to be the day that Capt. Allan Engle, Capt. Keith Rogers and Chris Westbury had last week. Proof positive that spring is an incredible time to be on the water had to be evidenced by their scorecard for the day. How’s this sound? A limit of gag grouper, 6 kingfish and 3 cobia. If that sounds fun, but not unbelievable, let me fill in a couple of other facts about their outing. How about the fact that they were back at the dock by 11:00am? Still not convinced that their action was truly incredible? Oh yeah, the 3 cobia were 30 pounds, 50 pounds, and 95 pounds respectively! Needless to say, congratulations are in order all around for Capt. Allen and the boys. What a day! Since our spring kingfish run is here right now, and the next month or two will offer the best shot we’ll probably ever get at 50 plus pound cobia, I might have to break away from the tarpon for a day or two. Now if I can just get a day off, I think we’ll have to get Capt. John’s 34 foot Baja out and stretch it’s legs a bit to see if we can get in on some of that offshore stuff!
Well, I hope this has given you some idea of what’s going on out there. This time of year, you just never know what’s gonna happen out there. Spring time is a magic time around here, so try and set aside some time to get out there real soon. If you want to set up a trip just drop me an e-mail at capt@fishtheflats.com or give me a call at (941) 722-1645.
Either way, we’ll be out there to let you know what’s going on,
Capt. Jason Ramsey
http://fishtheflats.com
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