Dang, fishing has been slow, for me anyway. Almost two whole days of fishing and I was only able to get four keepers, two trout and two black drum. This is my story and I’m sticking to it…

After not being able to fish for almost two weeks due to the weather/work relationship, I was able to go out this weekend; Saturday and Sunday.

Saturday I went to the Oak Hill, N-IRL and associated back waters. Sunday I focused on the southern lagoon and Indian River between the Max Brewer bridge and the NASA causeway. I got a later start than normal Saturday, launching out of Kennedy Point park around 10 am.

I headed out with live shrimp, frozen mullet (for my crab trap), and a castnet for live bait. I went out on my 95 highsider and room is at a premium so I wasted no time ditching the crab trap near the channel marker at Sand Point.

Then I went around to the other side of the sand bar to do a little scouting, live bait catching, and to just get a feel for the fishing. I got there at the outgoing tide so I set my anchor and fished for about 30-45 minutes. I only had live shrimp at this point so that’s what I used. I cast it up current close to the sand bank, weightless, and let it float past me a few times. I got some nibbles but nothing big enough to eat it whole.

Thinking shrimp wasn’t on the menu, I cast-netted a few times and caught Pilchards (I think, they’re shiny and quite slender and have greenish backs) and a couple finger mullet. I then put a Pilchard on hook with a 1/4 weight and cast it where I did the shrimp. Nothing.

After striking out, I went a bit up Callalisa Creek and used the same two baits along the oyster beds on the east side of the creek. I casted near them, into the coves, and along the deeper parts in the creek “channel.” Same result, I got a couple nippers abd even came back with a headless bloody Pilchard once, but nothing to speak of. Another hour or so of that and it was time to move again.

Next, I headed to the farthest North-East point of Pine Island Bay and let the wind push be down the bay. I repeated the techniques I tried at the two previous spots, but this time also had a 4 in. paddle bait thrown in. Unfortunately, I had the same result.

It was now about 1 pm so I tried one more spot before lunch. I went up Potts Creek from Pine Island Bay and repeated the steps above. Surprise, Surprise, same result.

Now it was definitely time for a lunch/beer break. Not wanting to pull the boat out I went to local watering hole accessible by foot not far from the New Smyrna Marina.

After lunch and not wanting to repeat the backwater no-fish catching of earlier in the day, I decided to fish the Indian River for the last couple hours of the day. I concentrated on docks and structure I could see and access from the river. I essentially got the same results as before. Nothing more nibblers, until the sun went down and I found a dock with a light. Two lights actually.

I noticed it had quite a bit of activity so I anchored about 15 feet away from it and worked every Pylon, post, and shaded part of the dock I could get a shrimp of Pilchard to. I noticed most of the action coming from the deeper parts where the boat is put on and backed from the lift so that’s what I concentrated on. I got a mixed bag of takers… smaller reds, snapper, snook, and finally two keeper trout (pic attached). Finally!

A hard day of fishing and only two fish to show for it. That’s fishing I suppose! I picked up my empty crab trap- stupid frozen mullet- and headed to the boat ramp.

P.S. This got a bit longer than expected and I’ll submit Sunday’s fishing report later.