On the Water: Holiday season out on the water
Mother Nature is forecasted to give us warm and nice weather through the Christmas holiday. Perfect for boaters taking time from work, and visitors and relatives visiting for the holidays to enjoy our outdoors.
If you are looking to put some meat on the table, pick a day with a low wind forecast and head west in Gulf waters. How far west depends on your target, boat’s capabilities and your personnel comfort zone and capabilities. There is no need to run far if that’s not your thing, or you are worried about passengers that are subject to sea sickness.
Hard bottom and reefs well within sight of land produce good fish through the winter. As I wrote last week, you may not fill the cooler with fish as large, but they are just as tasty without the long run and fuel bill.
If you have good bottom numbers nearshore you’re set, if not, look up the multitude of artificial reefs, pick one and make that your starting point. Many of the reefs are placed around good fishing bottom, so if fishing directly over the reefs isn’t producing, move around the area either drifting fishing or idle while watching the bottom machine. If you see something promising or catch a desired fish, mark the area and work it. For this type of bottom fishing, shrimp is the go-to bait, fished on a knocker rig, on a jig head or a chicken rig with multiple hooks. Small strips of squid are also an option to cut down on bait stealers. Always watch for surface feeding activity and keep a small shiny spoon rigged and ready. The good thing with nearshore fishing, if the weather turns, the bite is off or a passenger is feeling sick, it’s a short run back to inshore waters.
Further offshore the fish are bigger and generally the boats making the long run are too. Many anglers choose the buddy system with two or more boats making the trip together. This is popular with smaller and/or single power vessels. Once you get around nine miles offshore, you will lose cell service, so you will need other capabilities to communicate in the event of an emergency. There are man-made public reefs in deeper water that are good starting points and generally good bottom near them. Fishermen work hard and put in a lot of time to acquire good fishing numbers and work just as hard to keep their numbers to themselves, and rightly so. There is a lot of water and good bottom — there is no need to run up and fish near another boat in open water. Public reefs are a little different; boats often fish in closer proximity, but common sense is still needed.
If making the offshore run, begin monitoring weather forecast days before to make sure conditions are favorable. There are many good apps, I use Wind finder often.
Inshore, if you have been on the water, you have probably noticed the water clarity is getting good, meaning visibility has increased. This is a good time for exploring on a calm sunny day. From now until spring rains begin our waters are the clearest of the year. Either small artificial shrimp baits or live shrimp are the best baits to catch anything inshore through the cooler months. With the clear water and a good pair of polarized glasses, look around and explore new fishing areas. Watch the tides as we get extreme lows over many days this month. Inshore or offshore, there is no better feeling than locating and catching fish on spots you found yourself.
If not serious about fishing, it’s a great time to take the boat to a beach, cruise around and watch nature, or a lunch trip to one of the boat accessible restaurants. Or better yet, make a full day of it, and do it all!
We would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy Holiday season.
If you have a fishing report or for charter information, please contact us at Gulf Coast Guide Service; phone (239) 410-8576, email gcl2fish@live.com or you visit us on the Web at www.fishpineisland.com
Have a safe week and good fishin’.
As a lifetime resident of Matlacha and Pine Island, Capt. Bill Russell has spent his life fishing and learning the waters around Pine Island and Southwest Florida, and as a professional fishing guide for over 20 years.