volguy
Senior Member
Flew down to south florida on wednesday to fish a few days for a tourney held yesterday. tourney was out of flamingo (florida bay/upper part of the keys) and we were targeting tarpon, trout, redfish and snook (a grand slam tourney) if you watch blair wiggins addictive fishing or rick murphy, you would recognize the flamingo name.
fishing was pretty decent for the most part, but not the best. we were fishing the back country way back up where the water is almost fresh. man we were way up in the glades. his little 16 ft action craft is super shallow. it was so danged hot down there, i just couldn't believe it. each day it was in the 90's with heat indeces in the upper 90's to 100 degrees. man it was hot.
anyway, thursday started off slow. the fish turned on around 11:30 or so and we had to leave at 4 to be at the captains meeting that night. so we didn't get to catch them like we could have because of trying to find different spots. broke off a big snook first thing on a fluke (big fish cause i had 12lb. power pro which is equal to 50 lb test with a 25 lb p-line leader). line snapped like it was nothing as soon as i set the hook. soon after, my partner had a 25 lb. jewfish in the boat. he was big. we ended the day with around 10 snook, 25 or so nice trout, a couple of rat reds and tons of tarpon. we caught the tarpon each day in this one canal. they were in there like cord wood. my partner had found them about two weeks ago and i thought he was full of it when he said he was catching them every cast. he wasn't. they weren't big at all, probably biggest were around 6 lbs or so, but man those things are nuts. they just hook up and go crazy jumping everywhere.
friday was just the opposite. we caught fish most of the morning and then someone flipped the switch at about 2 and that was it. the fish didn't get the memo they were supposed to feed all day. another big snook broken off. couldn't do anything on him though. he ate and decided he needed to go home to the bushes really fast and that was that. you should have seen my power pro. looked like i had shaved it with a knife he ran so far up in the bushes. highlight of the day was a spot we found a big school of spanish mackeral messing around. i'm talking big spanish and they were all the way up there in that backcountry area. that just blew my mind. also had a big jack crevalle and some more really big trout. ended up with 8-10 snook, 25-30 really nice trout in the 18-22 inch range, the jack, lots of tarpon hookups and several nice spanish.
well, brotherman decided we hadn't done good enough prefishing and didn't want to look bad fishing the tourney. so i was on a flight saturday coming home.
so much for that fishing relationship. hahahahah a lot of trouble to go through to fish two days and come home the day of the tourney. 
it was a cool experience fishing there however. a little different than the place i frequent to the north in the everglades. this was true back country fishing with all the quick turns in the tight creeks and rivers and super shallow flats. i just couldn't believe catching all the fish we caught way up in that almost freshwater. we never got close to the outside (the ocean). the ramp area at flamingo was very hard to get to. we had to go through homestead and then another hour to the ramp. don't know if i will fish there often, but it was neat to do once. oh, and did i mention it was hot.
as you see, there are no pictures as i usually put up. to top off the whole saturday problem of not fishing the tourney and having to come home, i left the my digital camera sitting in one of the little carts at the airport. that really hurt. i am praying that the lost and found will have it. i have my doubts however since it is at hartsfield.
fishing was pretty decent for the most part, but not the best. we were fishing the back country way back up where the water is almost fresh. man we were way up in the glades. his little 16 ft action craft is super shallow. it was so danged hot down there, i just couldn't believe it. each day it was in the 90's with heat indeces in the upper 90's to 100 degrees. man it was hot.
anyway, thursday started off slow. the fish turned on around 11:30 or so and we had to leave at 4 to be at the captains meeting that night. so we didn't get to catch them like we could have because of trying to find different spots. broke off a big snook first thing on a fluke (big fish cause i had 12lb. power pro which is equal to 50 lb test with a 25 lb p-line leader). line snapped like it was nothing as soon as i set the hook. soon after, my partner had a 25 lb. jewfish in the boat. he was big. we ended the day with around 10 snook, 25 or so nice trout, a couple of rat reds and tons of tarpon. we caught the tarpon each day in this one canal. they were in there like cord wood. my partner had found them about two weeks ago and i thought he was full of it when he said he was catching them every cast. he wasn't. they weren't big at all, probably biggest were around 6 lbs or so, but man those things are nuts. they just hook up and go crazy jumping everywhere.
friday was just the opposite. we caught fish most of the morning and then someone flipped the switch at about 2 and that was it. the fish didn't get the memo they were supposed to feed all day. another big snook broken off. couldn't do anything on him though. he ate and decided he needed to go home to the bushes really fast and that was that. you should have seen my power pro. looked like i had shaved it with a knife he ran so far up in the bushes. highlight of the day was a spot we found a big school of spanish mackeral messing around. i'm talking big spanish and they were all the way up there in that backcountry area. that just blew my mind. also had a big jack crevalle and some more really big trout. ended up with 8-10 snook, 25-30 really nice trout in the 18-22 inch range, the jack, lots of tarpon hookups and several nice spanish.
well, brotherman decided we hadn't done good enough prefishing and didn't want to look bad fishing the tourney. so i was on a flight saturday coming home.
so much for that fishing relationship. hahahahah a lot of trouble to go through to fish two days and come home the day of the tourney. it was a cool experience fishing there however. a little different than the place i frequent to the north in the everglades. this was true back country fishing with all the quick turns in the tight creeks and rivers and super shallow flats. i just couldn't believe catching all the fish we caught way up in that almost freshwater. we never got close to the outside (the ocean). the ramp area at flamingo was very hard to get to. we had to go through homestead and then another hour to the ramp. don't know if i will fish there often, but it was neat to do once. oh, and did i mention it was hot.
as you see, there are no pictures as i usually put up. to top off the whole saturday problem of not fishing the tourney and having to come home, i left the my digital camera sitting in one of the little carts at the airport.
that really hurt. i am praying that the lost and found will have it. i have my doubts however since it is at hartsfield.
