- May 15, 2024
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Locally, the flounder bite has been hot. Use a Berkley Gulp on a jig head and work the shorelines of the Intracoastal Waterway.
For big trout, locate schools of glass minnows around docks and throw a Mirrolure 17MR for big results.
Though the fishing is good here, every so often, I feel the need to go fish a new area of Florida. So when I got a call from my buddy Steve Carl, we did just that.
Carl suggested we go to Scootsmoor and fish the northern area of the Indian River Lagoon.
Steve picked me up at 5:30 a.m. Friday, and we loaded up my tackle and set out on the drive to the boat ramp.
The drive from my house to the boat ramp took about 45 minutes. The boat ramp is small, but there is plenty of parking. The only drawback is there are no bathroom facilities. Once you launch your boat, it takes less than a minute to reach the open water and, within minutes, you can be fishing the grass flats.
Our target species that day was redfish.
Carl, having fished the area several times before, knew some of the better spots to search for fish. We drove to the shoreline on the north end, cut the motor, and Carl got up on the poling platform. We worked a couple of creek mouths and the shoreline with no luck. Then, we fired up the motor and moved to a different area.
We worked the shoreline of the new area and, again, no luck. It wasn’t until we moved about 50 yards off the shoreline that we started to see redfish. The water in this area is usually clea,r but the recent rain made the water murky and difficult to see fish. It wasn’t until we were right on top of the fish that we could see them.
By that time, you’ve already spooked them, and you could watch them swim off. We had a couple of shots at some cruising fish where Carl put a Berkley Gulp right in front of their noses, but they wouldn’t bite. I had a shot at a cruiser that stopped, but I lost where he went.
We didn’t catch any fish that day, but I did see enough of them to bring me back to Scottsmoor again.
