Another Central Florida Fishing Report
Thank you for reading another central Florida fishing report. I hope you are still maintaining your health and your sanity through this pandemic thing. In spite of what you may have heard, it’s not over yet.
Sunday– With a beautiful morning, and tired of being in the house, I again got the bicycle out and headed to what was for me a new area on the Econlockhatchee. A ride of about a mile put me at the river.
There were people fishing there.
I hid the bike and went through the woods the other way, picking up a few chiggers while I was at it. The river was tiny, just a creek. I did not see many fish. I did get to watch two otters (one at a time) frolic in the river right in front of me, very cool. A barred owl, right over my head, had an owl conversation with a friend a ways off.
I hooked one 10 inch bass on a riptide sardine. The fish shook off before I could land it. I had a great time walking through the woods, but I wouldn’t go back for the fishing.
Tuesday the wind was something less than 20 mph. I launched a kayak at Mosquito Lagoon and worked it hard.
The fish were not on. I saw two reds, did not get a shot. I saw a few black drum tailing. When the tail disappeared, the fish disappeared. The only bite I got was from a five pound black drum that took a redfish worm, and I felt lucky to get it.
I was asked for a photo of the redfish worm. It is a very simple fly.
Thursday was another beautiful day so I tried kayaking Mosquito Lagoon again. While hunting, I spotted a redfish as I passed it. When I turned to try to get a shot I couldn’t find the fish again. I waited and watched. The fish finally tailed, right next to the mangroves. I thought my cast was off, but the fish must have heard the fly hit the water. As I began to lift the rod for another cast the fish took the fly. Of course it shook right off.
Another redfish falls to the redfish worm.
A while later I ran over three black drum. I staked the boat, stood up, and waited. I got several shots over the next 40 minutes or so and pooched all of them, missing a few bites in the process.
I turned around and three redfish were cruising the shoreline. I dropped the fly on them on the backcast- BOOM! First fish of the day. It was almost one o’clock.
A fish crashed along the shoreline a few times. A saw the fish and made the cast- too long, right into a mangrove branch. I jerked the fly off, used that as the backcast, and splashed the fly down, hard, a couple feet in front of the fish. BAM! My second, and last, redfish of the day, and you’re not likely to get many in quite that way.
I’ve had some people ask me about chartering- while I could certainly use the funds, I’m still on self-quarantine. I’m staying there until everyone in my household thinks it’s safe to end it.
“I remember the good evenings I have fished, even the ones that realised material hopes not by the fish that came to the fly, but by the color and movement of water and sky, by the sounds and scents and gentle stirrings that were all around me.”
-Roderick Haig-Brown
Life is great and I love my work!
Every day is a blessing. Don’t waste it- Go Fishing!
John Kumiski, author of Fishing Florida by Paddle- An Angler’s Guide
Purchase Fishing Florida by Paddle- An Angler’s Guide at http://www.spottedtail.com/fishing-florida-by-paddle/
All content in this blog, including writing and photos, copyright John Kumiski 2020. All rights are reserved.
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