Winter time bush hooks...

[Panhandler80]

I've never set any bush hooks, and truth be told, most any freshwater fishing I attempt winds up being a disaster. However, I was thinking about trying to bush hook some catfish down here in NW Florida some time soon on Apalachicola system. Few questions I had:

1. Winter time can be productive best I can tell. This true?

2. Have read that daytime bite in winter can be just as productive as night time. True?

3. What depth do you fish your baits in say Jan or Feb? I was thinking send lead to the bottom and then maybe fish it 1-2' off the bottom. Open to suggestions.

4. Focus on main rivers, or try to get back in sloughs and little oxbows in the winter as well? Maybe 50/50 mix? Or would you lean more towards one over the other?

5. Not really interested in trying to catch live bait. Suggestions on readily available cut bait? I've read bacon works pretty well. Was also thinking maybe mullet filets?

6. What's the shortest time you'd let them soak taking into account this would be a first attempt? In a perfect word we'd set them on our way down to Apalachicola for the day / lunch, etc. Check them on the way back up river. Re-bait, and then check again in the morning.

TYIA!

 

[diamondback]

I’ve fished this river some up around the dam but none from blounstown south. But this is what I would do under the parameters you have listed. Put the lines in the outside bends of the river. That’s normally the deepest. Use enough weight to hold the bait near the bottom. Be sure you use a heavy duty swivel to keep the line from twisting into knots. Also for line I always use braided line and not twisted. For baits I would use fresh shrimp or fresh mullet. Fresh is important. Use smaller hooks for shrimp and bigger for mullet. Most fish on shrimp will be channel catfish which have smaller mouths and most mullet will catch blue catfish. The trip back up may get a few but more would probably be the overnight sits. Please remove the lines when you are done.

 

[Panhandler80]

I’ve fished this river some up around the dam but none from blounstown south. But this is what I would do under the parameters you have listed. Put the lines in the outside bends of the river. That’s normally the deepest. Use enough weight to hold the bait near the bottom. Be sure you use a heavy duty swivel to keep the line from twisting into knots. Also for line I always use braided line and not twisted. For baits I would use fresh shrimp or fresh mullet. Fresh is important. Use smaller hooks for shrimp and bigger for mullet. Most fish on shrimp will be channel catfish which have smaller mouths and most mullet will catch blue catfish. The trip back up may get a few but more would probably be the overnight sits. Please remove the lines when you are done.

Thanks. Good info! Would definitely remove lines! Speaking of bush hook lines... killed a gator a few years ago that had a hook lodged in his throat. He removed that limb line! Hahaha. It had been in there quite a while.

 

[Panhandler80]

I’ve fished this river some up around the dam but none from blounstown south. But this is what I would do under the parameters you have listed. Put the lines in the outside bends of the river. That’s normally the deepest. Use enough weight to hold the bait near the bottom. Be sure you use a heavy duty swivel to keep the line from twisting into knots. Also for line I always use braided line and not twisted. For baits I would use fresh shrimp or fresh mullet. Fresh is important. Use smaller hooks for shrimp and bigger for mullet. Most fish on shrimp will be channel catfish which have smaller mouths and most mullet will catch blue catfish. The trip back up may get a few but more would probably be the overnight sits. Please remove the lines when you are done.

You would n't bother trying to fish sloughs and little lakes off the main river? What about navigable creeks coming into the river?

 

[antharper]

You would n't bother trying to fish sloughs and little lakes off the main river? What about navigable creeks coming into the river?

Around the mouth of all of them

 

[diamondback]

I would only put them in moving water

 

[Panhandler80]

May give this a try this weekend. Will let you all know how it goes. Thanks!

 

[fishfryer]

The only freshwater fishing I’ve ever done in Florida was around Astor on the St John’s. If my memory is correct it’s not legal to set out baited hooks. Am I all wrong or is it legal in other parts of Florida?

 

[Panhandler80]

The only freshwater fishing I’ve ever done in Florida was around Astor on the St John’s. If my memory is correct it’s not legal to set out baited hooks. Am I all wrong or is it legal in other parts of Florida?

Pretty sure they are legal unless you're in an area that prohibits them. I'm going through all the regs right now. Have come up with a few questions of my own:

1. Says max of 25 hooks. It doesn't say if that's per boat, or per person.

2. Sounds like name and address has to be on every line. That's a real PITA and quite frankly, tells every methhead on the river that I'm not at that address.

3. Sounds like no parts of native fish may be used as bait. Niether can live goldfish. I wonder how a dead goldfish would perform?

 

[fishfryer]

Pretty sure they are legal unless you're in an area that prohibits them. I'm going through all the regs right now. Have come up with a few questions of my own:

1. Says max of 25 hooks. It doesn't say if that's per boat, or per person.

2. Sounds like name and address has to be on every line. That's a real PITA and quite frankly, tells every methhead on the river that I'm not at that address.

3. Sounds like no parts of native fish may be used as bait. Niether can live goldfish. I wonder how a dead goldfish would perform?

Thanks for the clarification

 

[Panhandler80]

sounds like max hooks of 25 is per boat, not license. I think.

Going to try to give it a shot this weekend.

Reading a lot of folks advocating lead just barely under water. I like idea of off the bottom just enough to keep bait suspended 2 feet or so off the bottom. Thoughts?

Going with shrimp and mullet.

 

[Panhandler80]

Here we go….

Gotta start somewhere! Got a pile of mullet. Skipped shrimp per local. Going to try squid instead (have 50 lbs already) and sine pre made nonsense bait out of pouch.

My plan is to fish every bait just a little bit off the bottom on big river near outflows, and might be a big hole or structure.

I am new to this, so I want to remove at least one variable. I already have three bats. You can only fish 25 bucks in Florida so put every single Bait at the same level and see what happens in early to mid February.

 

[Panhandler80]

Well, that was fun as ****! Learned a lot, and really looking forward to going back... which I think may have to be this coming weekend. Next time I'll be a lot more effecient, as I picked up on little things as we went along.

Anyway, we got a bit of late start Saturday morning. By the time we hit the water it was almost noon, and we had plans to join a buddy for lunch in Apalach, so we were kinda in a hurry. Per the direction of a family member I left MOST of my baits up high. Glad I did, because I think 4 of the 5 fish came on relatively high baits. We got out a total of 18 hooks. 25 is the legal limit. 15 of them were in one area, and I put 3 in a different area. The three produced nothing. So going 1 / 3 on the other 15 seems like a pretty good ratio to me, but I don't know much about this. They were all perfect sized eating fish, which was nice. Had mullet on every hook, and a piece of squid on some of them as well. Anyway, 5 fish... maybe 5 empty hooks, and about 5 that still had bait.

Couple questions:

1. I kept coordinates on every limb that produced a fish. Do you think I should focus on them again next time, or is not that crucial? My 15 (and my 3 in the other area) were probably on average 50 yards apart. I can't imagine a certian limb being that important, but willing to focus on them and skip the ones that didn't even lose bait.

2. Timing... like I said, we put baits our around noon. I imagine that's about the worst possible time to do so. I would assume that the bait is most effective when it's fresh. That being said, do you think I should expect more success if we deployed them in late afternoon, or even in the dark? Or prior to sun up?

3. My area 2 was on outside of main river, and you talk about deep. Holy cow. I'm betting 30 feet. I fished those right off the bottom and thought for sure one of them would produce, but no such luck. All of the other hooks were on a straight away portion fo main river in pretty shallow water. Like 2-10 feet. The really shallow stuff produced nothing. Seemed like the 7-8 was the sweet spot. To be expected? The really deep hole on outside of turn surprised me. I don't have a bottom machine on the boat, so no telling what was in big hole. Maybe not enough structure to hold fish? Curious what yall think.

4. Would like to mix the baits up a little more next time. Was going to go 1/3, 1/3, 1/3, mullet, shrimp and some commercial stuff. However, considering it was my first go of it, I didn't want too many variables. Figured I'd keep bait more or less uniform, and then focus on learning spots. Needed to ahve at least one constant to figure that out. Nowthat I have at least one verified area, I'd like to mix it up some. Suggestions? Guy at tackle shop very experciened in it, and he said he doesn't like using shrimp. Said he gets lots of bare hooks.

Anyway, a really fun time and I'm looking forward to brining our boy back out there. The really cool part was that the first line we checked had one and the limb was shaking. Not only that, but it was also the biggest of the day! What relaxing way to fish!

Thanks for the suggestions a week or so ago. Oh... and last night's supper was fantastic! Oh, and gator pic, just for the heck of it. Figured some of yall might get a kick out of that. 10 footer this past summer.

 

[diamondback]

Looks like you did fine. What we normally do is put hooks out just before dark. Check them about every 3 hours or at least 3-4 hours after dark and then again at sun up. Yes some hooks will outperform others for whatever reason. So checking them a couple times will add more fish and lets you rebait empty hooks. It also lets you tweak your set ups as for as depth and baits and locations. I would be happy with a 1/3 ratio if I had 25 hooks out and checked the 2-3 times.

 

[Panhandler80]

Looks like you did fine. What we normally do is put hooks out just before dark. Check them about every 3 hours or at least 3-4 hours after dark and then again at sun up. Yes some hooks will outperform others for whatever reason. So checking them a couple times will add more fish and lets you rebait empty hooks. It also lets you tweak your set ups as for as depth and baits and locations. I would be happy with a 1/3 ratio if I had 25 hooks out and checked the 2-3 times.

Awesome. Thanks. Guess 1/3 with one check is pretty darn good then. Thanks for the feedback. Hoping to go again next weekend.

EDIT: So, my wife took notes as we checked them. Again, 15 in one area, and then three in a different. The fish came from hook numbers: 1, 5, 10, 12 and 13. Number 6 and 7 were actually the only two with no bait... I thought there were more than that, but I guess not.