January 25-- BIG Jacks on the beach, some Spanish too

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I took Mike out Sunday morning for a quick 4-hour trip along the beach, looking for the schools of big jack crevalle. By big, I mean 30- to 40-pounders. He'd been wanting to catch one on a fly rod with a popper.

Once the sun finally got up a little bit we found the schools around the reef and started casting. Before that we were just messing with the schools of Spanish mackerel, catching about a 7-pounder on an X-Rap.

When we found the jacks, they were very boat-shy at first, but a couple casts with the topwater teaser riled them up enough to at least get them to strike. Quick note about jacks: They're not very good at the first pass. Mike had several strike the popper, but miss before he finally hooked up. The fight was on as he tried to remain upright and I tried to maneuver the boat through the crowd and keep the fish out of the reef. An amazing 20 minutes later (Mike knows how to handle a fly rod) we netted a 35-pound jack and snapped a couple shots.

I dropped Mike off at the dock and picked up Melissa for just a fast trip along the beach. Once again we found the schools of jacks and threw a Yo-Zuri popper to them. Melissa didn't know what she in for when she began pulling (to no avail) against the crevalle on the other end of the line. Every tug was answered with about 20 yards of line rolling off the Quantum reel. And she thought she was gonna have to work out that night! Ha! We finally got the fish to the boat, snapped a couple pictures, let it go and she was ready to call it a day, so we headed in.

January 23--Offshore, battling dolphin

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The winds went west and I was able to get offshore, hoping to take advantage of what should have been a really good sailfish bite, thanks to the front moving through two days earlier. Picked up some BEAUTIFUL blue runners off one of the buoys and headed offshore. At 130 feet I came across a decent rip line, deployed the runners, sat back and waited. Within 30 minutes I had two 10- to 12-pound dolphin hounding the baits, snatching one and then attacking the other while I tried to entice them with a topwater lure. Luckily, those dolphin appeared just as the wind shifted to the north and it started to be time to head back in.

It turned out to be a short offshore trip, but it was well worth trip.

January 2 --scouting/fishing

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I got out by myself on Jan. 2, just to do some looking around to see what was going on. I fished some docks and basically just scouted the river. There seems to be a decent snook bite in the St. Lucie and all the jacks and ladyfish you could possibly want right now in the Indian River. Pompano are skipping anytime you run a flat. If the water temperature drops a little bit more, the bluefish will really make their presence known. I spooked plenty of flounder while running the trolling motor along the shallow sand. Spanish mackerel are all over the inlet.

When it comes to variety, this is one of my favorite times of the year to fish. You don't need anything crazy; just some light tackle and a few shrimp or pilchards will be more than enough.

Dec. 31: The Pathfinder arrives!! Ran into some cobia

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Finally!! The new boat is here. The 22-foot Pathfinder Tournament has officially been signed for and parked in front of the house.

The maiden voyage was with my friend, Tom, down from Macon, Georgia for the New Years holiday. We went out the St. Lucie Inlet, hoping to head to the 14 Buoy for bait. The winds switched from the west to the north and it was choppy, but we held out for a little while to see what was going on. We ran into a school of 8 to 10 cobia, the biggest looked to be about 20 pounds. Because we hadn't gotten to the sardines yet, we threw the MirrOlures that were tied on, but only got passing interest from the cobes. There was also a bunch of Spanish mackerel jumping around out there. After getting battered for a while by the northerly chop, we headed back in and fished the flats for pompano and some snook spots.

Dec. 27 and 28: Finally! Back on the water!

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I got to get out for a couple of short trips on Dec. 27 and 28. On the 27th, we stayed south of the Stuart Causeway and hunted around a couple of spots, looking for bait, then spent the rest of the day drifting the Sailfish Point Flats (along with everyone else) for pompano. Caught a 5-pounder and then a 2-pounder on jigs. Also managed to nab a bunch of ladyfish and jacks. Lots of jacks. Which was cool because we were using light tackle.

On the 28th, we went north of the Jensen Beach Causeway, once again looking for bait, but also scouting a few trout, redfish and snook spots. Found LOTS of mullet (and hungry porpoises more than willing to deplete the mullet population) and fished some flats and shorelines for trout. Mike caught two trout before we moved back down river and fished some more shorelines, where I caught a couple of snook on MirrOlures.