Blog for Oct. 18, 2012

Fishing is fine today and no signs of any red tide from Venice to Boca Grande!

Redfish and trout are hungry and bit like crazy for the last two days. Dick Gray and friends caught more than fifty redfish and fifty trout plus a few snook; that’s a hundred plus fish in ten hours, on their trips Wednesday and Thursday. Baitfish are small but plentiful and just big enough. Smaller pinfish are catching larger reds and trout but minnows are fine. It’s hard to predict how events will alter our catching but its red hot right now. Fall is here and waters are cooling slightly; this makes fish hungry! The weather has been perfect, cloudy and into the eighties.  The new Evinrude E-Tec has expanded our range with new speed and efficiency. Fishing will continue to excel as long as weather and current condition hold.

It is so much fun when things work like advertised. Wednesday’s trip started out from home port of Stump Pass Marina at daybreak with the new Evinrude 200 behind us. The power package is perfect for the 23 feet Dorado; light enough for shallow water fishing yet plenty of power to cruise efficiently. Best of all cruising speed is now thirty plus MPH at three miles per gallon. While that is not good for your car it’s awesome for a boat with four adults, a full tank of fuel and baitwell. Time will tell how it all works out but it is impressive now! Minnows were caught down in Charlotte Harbor so we checked out some close by spots and found gold. The waters are dark from rain runoff so we rigged with popping corks for their weight in casting and noise attraction. The darker waters make redfish golden bronze and trout have golden yellows also. Remember you need to pop the cork frequently for best results. The tide was falling so we choose a deeper edge with a current eddy to begin.  The trout started off both days immediately and the redfish moved through at low water. Because of all the red tide scare very few boats were out and we sat and caught fish till their arms hurt; a great problem for the guys to talk about at dinner. Most of the trout and reds were in the slot.

Saturday the game plan is to troll for kings and mackerel off of Venice. The E-Tec burns two tenths of a gallon per hour, at idle speed, five hundred RPMs. That’s unbelievable but Captain Van has experienced it on two different motors! One of the other captains returned with several kings today while we ate lunch at the Stump Pass Grille after our trip. Threadfins were reported to be abundant plus kings and sharks hungry! It took forever to get the new motor set up but it’s exciting to feel the power and enjoy the economy.

This is prime time fishing for reds, trout, snook inside and both mackerel outside. Beautiful weather allows us to take advantage of this Fall bite, don’t wait too long! Let’s go Fishin’ now! Captain Van Hubbard. <www.captvan.com>