black drum

Captain Justin and I started off this week with an incredible black drum bite in the Indian River. We found schools of 50 to 200 fish each roaming the flats during early morning periods. By mid morning these fish would drop off onto the deeper edges but continue feeding well into the day.

We were using a very simple rig to get these fish to eat. It consisted of a large split shot about a foot above a 3/0 circle hook. For bait we prefer a piece of crab flavored Fishbites tipped with a blanched sand flea. Most of these fish are running 15 to 30 pounds, but we caught a few that were pushing 35 pounds in some of these schools.

One thing we would recommend that you do is to not push the school with your boat and trolling motor. Black drum will stay in an area for quite some time feeding on shrimp, clams, and other mollusks on the bottom, as long as they’re not disturbed by your boat encroaching too close to the school.

Many of you out there may think that fishing guides like Captain Justin and myself consistently catch fish every single time we’re out on the water. I just want to let each of you know that nothing could be further from the truth. I had the second day this year where we didn’t catch a fish on a charter. I don’t usually run charters on Saturdays after my morning live radio program, but this past Saturday afternoon I made a special exception for a long time customer of mine. He had just purchased a new flats boat and was excited about getting out in the Mosquito Lagoon to try it out. We launched out of Riverbreeze boat ramp and ran to one of my favorite spots. We dropped off plane and immediately started seeing good numbers of black drum, trout and a couple of redfish. We cast live shrimp and live fingerling mullet to these fish only to have them either snub their nose at our offering or completely run away from them. Spot number 2, 3, and 4 produced similar results. We also tried cut mullet, cut shrimp, sea shad tails, gulp shrimp, and suspending plugs to no avail. Despite seeing roughly 60 to 70 fish that day we did not get a single hookup. So, the next time you’re out on the water and you don’t catch a fish, don’t worry because it happens to all of us at one time or another.

For anyone interested in booking a charter with Captain Justin or myself you can give us a call on our office line at 321-636-3728. To hear our live radio show, follow our Catch a Memory Outdoors page on Facebook for notification on Saturday mornings from 7 to 9 am or tune in to 1510 am to hear our show. Until next week, do what we’re going to do, get out there and catch yourself a memory.