Banana River Lagoon Fishing Report

Upcoming Events-

First Coast Fly Fishers meeting, 7 PM November 4, Southpoint Marriot, 4670 Salisbury Rd Jacksonville. My topic will be Winter Fly Fishing in the Indian River Lagoon.

Indian River Lagoon Paddle Adventure starts December 1. Paddle a section or the length of the lagoon with us!

This week’s blog posts:
And Now For a Little Good News
NOAA To Eliminate Paper Charts

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My Mitzi Skiff 17 is for sale. For information, visit this link: http://www.spottedtail.com/mitzi-skiff-sale/

On Sunday I gave the On-the-Water Show and Tell Seminars on Mosquito Lagoon. Five people in two separate trips circumnavigated the lagoon with me, stopping here and there to discuss navigation, fishing strategies and techniques, and more. The water is still high but it will drop soon.

If the blooming goldenrods all along the roads didn’t tell you, winter is almost here. The red maples will be turning color and dropping their leaves any day now.

There were big rafts of ducks out on the lagoon, and the white pelicans are already here in numbers. So in the near future the water will drop and also finally clear up. That having been said, the cleanest water in the lagoon, where it looks like it should look, is on the south side of the pole/troll area. And, no, we did not see many fish at all.

On Tuesday Tom Van Horn, Rodney Smith and I launched our paddle craft from the NASA Causeway and paddled down to SR 528 on the Banana River Lagoon, a linear distance of about six miles. I was able to try out my new Bending Branches Sunburst ST paddle, a beautiful and highly functional piece of equipment. Using spin tackle Tom got two dink trout and hooked and lost a nice redfish. Rodney and I used fly tackle and did not get a shot. We saw something like one fish per mile, pretty slim pickings. It will be a while before I go back there.

Early morning on the Banana River Lagoon.

Tom tries, without success, to get a bite.

Rodney gets some casting practice.

That having been said, there were decent numbers of mullet there and the grass looked pretty good. The water could be more clear but hopefully falling water temperatures will clean it up.

Thursday morning found me running on the Florida Trail, the first such excursion since returning from Alaska. I must admit to having been scared off by ticks and chiggers. Halloween should have scared them off.

I carried a dead palmetto frond as a spider web catcher and knocked down at least five instead of running in to them. Nothing will make you want to stop running down the trail more than a banana spider crawling around on your face! The trail looked beautiful with all the fall wildflowers blooming.

Spiders build their webs across the path- beware!

Carphephorus flowering along the path.

Quite a bit of my time is being spent preparing for the Paddle Adventure, so I didn’t get out in the boat on Friday either. I did go running in the state forest along the Econlockhatchee River. It looks wintery there, too, with the willows dropping their dying leaves. Although the water was very tannin-stained, the river was running low and looked really nice. I believe I will try paddling and fishing it one day next week.

Argonaut Publishing Company is having a big Christmas Sale on all of its fishing books by one Capt. John Kumiski. Visit this link to do some holiday shopping!

That is this week’s exciting version of the Banana River Lagoon Fishing Report.

Life is great and I love my work!

Life is short. Go Fishing!

John Kumiski
http://www.spottedtail.com

All content in this blog, including writing and photos, copyright John Kumiski 2013. All rights are reserved.