It was windy offshore, but people fished anyway

It was a little windy for offshore fishing this weekend, but it sure didn’t keep people from fishing inshore. I know we still have a lot of freshwater coming from South Georgia, but what we’ve had so far, and we have had a bunch, hasn’t hurt fishing too much. The water is dark but I prefer that to it being crystal clear which it would have been had we not had the rain.

Tammy Morgan at Jerry’s Bait and Tackle said she doesn’t know what the cold is going to do to fishing, but right now the shellcrackers on are the bed in the Wakulla River and earthworms is what everyone is using. Lots of people fished the flats over the weekend, but none stopped back by to give a report. The four foot seas didn’t keep Capt. Clemons from heading offshore in search of grouper. He took Rick Andrews and Pop Clemons out of St. Marks and they headed out about two miles and fished on the bottom and did some trolling. For their efforts they came in with six nice gags and a red grouper. Jerry Griffin of Griffin Auto in Crawfordville took his son and a couple of friends to some deep holes about 30 miles out and they limited out on gags. They used LY’s and squid on the bottom to fill the cooler. On April 19, Jerry’s will be holding its Second Team Seatrout Tournament. The fee is $50 per team and cash prizes will be paid to first, second and third places.

Mike Hopkins at Lanark Village said this was the most fishermen that launched out of Lanark since July 4 and he was sure glad to see it. The weather kept most offshore fishermen in close because of the rough seas but Brian Fletcher, who holds a reef permit, went out and fished a couple of days in 60 to 80 feet of water and caught a bunch of grouper. There was one king caught over the weekend and several cobia seen, but none caught. Trout fishing is very, very good and everyone was bringing in plenty of fish. Lanark Reef, the area out from the water tower, southeast of the big pier at the new condos and Turkey Point Reef, seemed to be some of the better spots. Live shrimp, the Gulp and shiner tails were what most people used. The Capt. Joey Hampton party came in with their limit of trout and Capt. Terry Caruthers took his wife Paula and they came in with a nice catch of trout. Lots of reds are being caught around the docks west of the condo dock and live shrimp, Gulp and gold spoons produced. Lots of Spanish were caught about 300 yards out from the condos mostly by folks just fishing for trout though some threw small spoons and did rather well. Mike said a few people went to St. George looking for pompano but he didn’t hear any reports.

Last week, Jeff and Kay May from Carrolton, Ga. had hopes of going out grouper fishing. Although it was rough they were able to fish a little in close. They caught the first cobia I have heard of this year but it two inches shy of being legal. On Wednesday, the wind blew so hard they fished a couple of hours on the flats and caught five trout. He said they must have been drifting at about eight or 10 knots. I took them out Friday for a couple of hours and we caught 12 keepers and threw back about 25 or 30. We didn’t catch any Spanish, but we did see quite a few. Mark Prance from Shell Point had some friends from the Atlanta area down and they fished half a day on Sunday and caught nine keeper trout and a nice Spanish.

Hopefully the two cold days at the first of the week won’t hurt fishing and I think the rain will really help. Remember to leave that float plan and know your limits. Be careful out there and when you think it’s too rough to go it probably is and there are going to be better days ahead. Good luck and good fishing!