WEEKLY FORECAST

The bite the last few weeks has been nothing short of phenomenal! From big tarpon in the river and the ocean to snook fishing and bull redfish on the flats, the possibilities have been endless.

With the approaching opening of snook season anglers are getting anxious to get their slot fish, snook are starting to make their move around the beaches and bait pods in good numbers, live baits such as pogies and croakers are great “go to’s.” When fishing along the surf, look for small troughs and sloughs and fish a weightless or minimal lead on incoming tide for the best results. There’s still plenty of fish around the inlets, as well, and can be caught using the same methods.

As the glass minnow schools ball up tight to the surf, this is a great time to take advantage of a swim bait bite. Artfical swimbaits such as hogy and savage gear fished around these glass minnow pods can result with large snook and tarpon and make for great fun. Make sure you’re using a larger setup to get these fish in to avoid killing them as the summer heat does a number on these fish with buildup of Latic acid in their backs. An 8ft heavy action rod with an 8-10k size reel and 50lb braid is a perfect matched combo. Anglers can find some great fishing in the next few weeks as fall approaches and I encourage everyone to get out and enjoy some of the best fishing of the year!

What a great week we had. The winds are non-existent and the bunkers are plentiful. Hot is the word of the week, though. Is it me or has it just been brutal? To our guests, please hydrate the day prior and day of. Lay off alcohol and coffee. It’s HOT.

Take your bunker and hit pelican or 8A, and you will do just fine catching kings and random species like cobia, sails and mahi. All the fish are in the same areas. Check out Capt Joey’s pics from this week. Absolutely killed it every day. What we noticed this week was that the fish are turning on and off quickly. Just cause you’re not catching them now, grind it out till you get them fired up, chum the water with livies and they will start to show up.

We haven’t done much bottom fishing this week. That’s been a little slow and honestly consistent this time of year. But you can still give it a shot and try to get an AJ hooked up. Good Luck!

Happy Monday SpaceFish Family,

Picking back up with the Eau Gallie River today. There is only one public launch area at Ballard Park which I detailed last week, so if you want to know more, go check out Part I.

Breaking Up the River – So I want to talk about the main EGR in 3 sections: The Marina, The Eastern River and the Western River. The Marina is the area between Ballard Park and the Highway 1 Bridge; The Eastern River is between the the Harbours Apartment Boat Ramp (private residential access only – I used to live there and they will tow people that park there without permission); and the Western River is from that Ramp down to the EGR Dam.

Fishing the Marina – Not really something I’d recommend doing in a kayak for several reasons, it has a lot of boat traffic and usually this is the choppiest water. There’s not a lot of great structure to fish in the open water and you can’t really get in and fish around the private marina property. BUT there are very large tarpon that roll and roam out in the deeper water here and I’ve tangled with a few while trolling through. This would be a great place to fish with big live mullet from a boat, it’s tough in a kayak. I have trolled a Berkley Flicker Shad through here and gotten big Tarpon to hit, but they usually give me a sleigh ride and thrill but I haven’t been able to keep one on long enough to tire it down and land it. I love the Berkley Flicker Shad it’s meant for freshwater guys to troll for crappie but if you replace the trebles with in-line hooks can be a great trolling lure for Tarpon. I’ll get more into this later. This can also be a great place to drop anchor and throw out cut bait for Bull Sharks. Just make sure to anchor away from boat traffic for obvious reasons. I’m sure that you could also catch Tarpon this way, but the issue would be you can’t move to stalk the ones that are rolling – I’ve never caught a Tarpon this way but I’m sure it’s do-able.

Fishing the Western River – At this part of the river you will see a medley of structure lining both banks of the river – rocks, docks, fallen trees, bushes, take your pick! It can be a little overwhelming and it can be easy to fall into the rabbit hole and waste hours of time fishing every piece of structure and not catching many fish.

Here is the best piece of advice I can give to having success on the Eau Gallie River, and this applies to all parts of the river…paddle and cover ground and look for signs of life. 90% of fish are in 10% of the water, that is the gospel of inshore fishing. These signs of life can be birds, especially wading birds stalking small baitfish and baitfish activity. And just because you have successfully targeted the right areas, it doesn’t guarantee hook ups – you have to match the hatch! It doesn’t take a giant tackle box to catch a lot of fish – I caught a grand slam this weekend on one artificial lure profile. When you see baitfish activity try and observe what size this bait is, come prepared with 2, 3 and 4 inch profiles in a light color and dark color and appropriate hooks/jig heads and you will be set!

Fishing the Western River, what I like to do is cruise around and once I see what I’m looking for I hone in on that area and pick it apart. That’s how I catch most of my Snook and Tarpon. Fishing close to bait pods will also bring catches of ladyfish, Jacks, Black Drum, Reds and Trout if they are in the river. This weekend I caught small Trout, Reds and Black Drum close to the minnow schools. Black Drum only around minnow schools and docks.

In the middle of this section of the river is the train tracks, which can be a great place to weave in and out of a kayak power fishing with artificial, or something I have done before anchor down, and throw bait around the pilings. I really like throwing fiddler crabs and I’ve actually gone to the beach and caught sand fleas and used those too. Shrimp will work but you will catch as many catfish with shrimp as anything else. The crabs seem to be better for staying on target with the species you want to catch. This is a great way to catch Sheepshead, and Tarpon. My first ever tarpon came on a fiddler crab at the train track bridge.

One of my favorite parts of this section is a small creek on the south bank, just south of the train track, this creek is really low and the back is dried out right now due to lack of rainfall, but when the water levels are up this can be a kayak anglers dream for Juvie Tarpon and Snook of all sizes. I fished the mouth of it this weekend and caught 4 Snook and a baby Red in there, it’s also well shaded by large trees and can be a great place to fish later in the day on hot sunny days as this water stays cooler for longer in the day, bait gets flushed in this creek from the main river and this is a high trafficked area for all of the predator fish.

This was my 2nd Tarpon yesterday, I was using a 2 inch Swimbait on a 1000 series reel, 6 pound braid and 12 pound mono – this size provides a lot of fun action on lite tackle in a kayak!

Fishing the Eastern River – Once you get past the apartment boat ramp there a few docks within the first hundred yards on the north bank, but outside of this, it is nothing but mangroves. And with the water levels being low, it’s easier than ever to make skip casts back into the shade pockets. Again, I’d highly advise stalking signs of life before fishing an area. It’s like the Patriots of the American Revolution at Bunker Hill, to preserve ammunition they were told to hold their fire until they saw the whites of their enemies eyes. I’ve learned that saving time and energy until I see bait and birds leads to catching a lot more Snook!

As you’re stalking this end of the river, don’t neglect the middle, there will definitely be Tarpon rolling here too. Eventually the river runs into the dam behind the Eau Gallie 1st Baptist Church. This dam can be highly productive after a good rainfall and water is dumping over from the freshwater side. This is also a fishing hot spot for shore anglers so be careful when approaching, and keep your head on swivel so you don’t get pinged in the head by a 12 year old launching a hard plastic plug with treble hooks at you as you round the corner. This can be a great place to get out and stretch your legs too before saddling back up to head back up the river.

My Recent Trip – So I was out there yesterday. I fished all the way to the dam and back, and was on the water fishing for roughly 6 hours. I caught 13 Snook from 2 slot size to a few very small juveniles, 2 good size juvenile Tarpon, 2 small Redfish, 2 Black Drum – one small, and one medium size, 3 juvenile Trout around docks close to Ballard Park, and 4 Mayan Cichlids. I only lost 2 fish I had hooked, I got broken off on a good sized Snook, I couldn’t get it out of the Mangrove roots, and had what would have been my biggest ever Tarpon in the Marina but it spit the hook on its second jump. I only threw 3 baits – My most productive was the 2 inch swimbait again, I used a micro set up, a 1000 series reel with 6 pound braid and 12 pound mono, both of my Tarpon came on this set up, and 1 of my larger Snook as well. I caught a few Snook on a 3 inch DOA CAL paddle tail in Rootbeer/Gold Flake with a ⅛ oz weedless twistlock hook, and I caught the other Slot Snook on a Gambler TZ in Chicken on a Chain color on DOA’s 1/0 1/16 oz Jighead, this bait also produced the Black Drum and Redfish bites. I trolled the Berkley Flicker Shad and that is what got the bite from the bigger Tarpon but he spit the hook, I also caught a Mayan Cichlid on the troll coming out of the dam as well.

All in all the key to success is going small and light in the approach. Getting out early this time of year always increases the chances of a good back, but good Snook can be caught with good skip casting under the mangroves and under docks.

I hope this report helps those wanting to get out and have a fun kayak fishing experience. I met a really nice couple out yesterday and they mentioned they had read last weeks report and were out on the river to give it a shot. It was so nice to meet you, I hope you guys had a great trip! My email is knoxrobinson1604@gmail.com – please feel free to reach out if you want, I’d love to hear how the trip went after I bumped into ya’ll.

I hope everyone has a great week, and has a chance to get out on the water and catch some fish! Kids are back in school this week, so ya’ll pray for me!

I’ve been out of town (went to Colorado to take my granddaughter back home) and only fished a couple days this week. Last Friday we fished Stick Marsh and caught lots of quality fish. The biggest was 6lbs but we lost a huge fish on a Reaction Innovations Skinny Dipper (Sprayed Grass) weightless. My client thought she was hung up on a stump until it started swimming. She almost got it in the boat but the fish spit the hook.

This week we fished Headwaters and we threw mostly big baits and punched a little. The Mike Bucca Bullshad Wake was the bait of choice. Lots of short stokes but managed to catch some nice fish on the wake. We flipped for a couple hours and the bites were light but we did put a few in the boat. Black and blue creature baits in dirty water and watermelon candy in clean water was the deal.

Went over to Stick today and got some good fish dragging worms. We got most of the fish today on watermelon red speed worms and Junebug red Ole Monster worms. I had one break me off on the Monster worm which was disappointing but there will be more opportunities in the future. Jim had a big fish today with me on the watermelon red speed worm that weighed over 6lbs and was a super long fish just no belly. I went up in weight at stick marsh so my bait stayed down in the shells. I was using a 3/8 ounce weight and when the wind picked up I went to a half ounce.

Good luck this weekend!!! I’m out everyday next week so I’ll give you guys a better report.

The near coastal waters are full of great fighting species for this week’s fishing report. Snook are schooling along the beaches and when you find a group of them you are sure to get into some great rod-bending action. I’ve been netting pogies to use for bait all week. I’m rigging these on a 5/0 to 6/0 VMC circle hook and some 50 to 60- pound test Sufix fluorocarbon leader material to keep these big fish from cutting through the line.

Other species that we are encountering on our coastal excursions are tarpon, Crevalle Jack-affectionately known as “beach donkeys,” king mackerel, and a variety of shark species. In the lagoons the snook bite is good on most mornings as well. Look for these fish around docks and overhanging mangrove branches. Live fingerling mullet, small croakers, or a nice lively shrimp will generally get them to bite.

We’ve got a few days open this month so if you would like to get out there to catch your next memory, please give us a call at 321-636-3728 or go to our website Fineline Fishing Charters and book your trip on our reservation page.

It’s Hot! I might add — and it’s not the fishing, either. I spent last week fishing a one saltwater and one freshwater outing with a combined total of 7 hours on the water. We start at 6am and finish up around 9:30. Our first outing was on the Lagoon, we worked the mangroves on the east side of the river first throwing topwaters. Only a couple of small trout caught. There’s a lot of bait in the river during the low light hours but go deeper as the sun gets higher in the sky. We then slowed things down by hitting up Honest Johns fish camp for a few dozen shrimp. We set up on points with shallow water with deeper waters close to it. Our rigs consisted of a Popping Cork and a 1/0 circle hook. We were able to pick up several small trout, mangrove snapper and one of the biggest Atlantic Croaker that I have ever seen.

Our next outing was once again on 3 Forks. The waters haven’t been pumping since we have had little rain and we caught bass and bluegill for the first 2 hours until the light switch turned off. Not a bad two days of outings for the little time spent on the waters. We have at least 2 more months of the heat to put up with before we start to feel Fall in the air.

It seems as though we are in the dog days of summer here in the Central FL area with heat index’s in the 100’s this past week. Although temps have been hot it has not effected the fish as they have been chewing well. It has definitely been a morning bite throughout Mosquito Lagoon targeting trout and redfish in the shallows before the water heats up in the afternoon. The backwaters of New Smyrna Beach has been about the same as well with some of the deeper shorelines and creeks having a little cooler water temps. Artificials and live bait both have been working well for a variety of species like jacks,snook,redfish and trout. The weather forecast looks to be the same for the up coming week so I don’t see the bite slowing down.

Currently on our fishing charters, we’re catching whiting, pompano, catfish, blacktip sharks and jack crevalle with the occasional snook in the mix. The red slime that’s plagued our central east coast region stretches from Fort Pierce to Cape Canaveral. This has definitely been the biggest factor impacting success of surf fishing anglers along the Space Coast. While many are deterred to battle with the slime, there are fish available to catch for those determined few.

Whiting and pompano continue to show in spurts from Patrick Air Force Base to Sebastian Inlet. Many of the pompano are undersize with a few keepers in the mix. The whiting are also relatively small compared to the bulls we get in the winter and spring. But with that being said, if you can put a catch together with a handful of whiting, croakers and one keeper pompano, that’s a good day under the current conditions.

Fishbites, sandfleas and peeled shrimp have performed the best for the whiting, croakers and pompano. Pompano rigs with white and chartreuse floats have seemed to outperform the rest. Currently the first and second trough have produced more exciting catches than beyond the sandbar. I look for this trend to continue with the slime that’s taken over, accompanied by the fact the bait fish are going to start pushing down the shoreline running in those inside waters.

Blast off with September surf fishing along the Space Coast! This time of year traditionally marks the beginning of the fall mullet run. Millions of baitfish will be migrating down the shore lines and evading all the opportunistic predators along the way. Big snook and tarpon along with jack crevalle, bluefish, ladyfish and sharks will be a few of the species electrified by this phenomenon.

Surf fishing tactics may very from angler to angler depending on their experience and species targeting techniques. Live bait rigged with or without a weight is always a good choice when presenting to these nearshore water predators. Also using a fish finder rig or split shot can be effective in presenting your baits down in the strike zone if there’s high surf. Alternatively casting a diving plug, swim bait or bucktail along the first and second trough will ensure a high probability for success.

All in all it’s and exciting time of year to hit the beach for surf fishing. If we could see relief from the slime then that would make it that much better.

It’s challenging to fight through the slime and sargassum, but for those willing to put in the work rewards can be had. Whether you’re targeting whiting or pompano or catch and release sharks, it’s all out there for the opportunistic and ambitious few. Good luck and have fun.

It’s time to play tug of war with the beach donkeys! Cold water upwellings this week are moving fish all around the Space Coast near shore waters. Shark, Jack, tarpon, kingfish and Cobia are all possible catches for anglers right now. I’ve been slow trolling with live pogies to get these various fish to eat. Topwater plugs are also working on the sharks and jacks.

The Rapala X-plied is one of my favorite lures to cast at the species in the lagoons. This includes juvenile tarpon, large snook, and trout And redfish, which can be found near docks, rocky areas, and under mangrove trees. Live shrimp, pilchards, and the small lures that imitate them are top choices.

It’s a great time for a mixed bag of fish and possibly even an inshore flats slam or grand slam if you’re lucky. Give us a call at 321-505-8217 or book us online at FinelineFishingCharters.com and let’s go catch your next memory!

Greg went 2-3 on some nice tarpon along the beach!

The cold water upwelling has hit the beaches to the north and water temp has dropped 6-8 degrees. We are still finding some jacks, tarpon and sharks on the beach but not in big numbers. Inlet has some snook and redfish along with jacks with live bait the key. We are finding some snook and trout in the lagoon in decent numbers and some bait, as well.

Happy Monday SpaceFish Family,

We started back to school (pre-planning)l this week as teachers so getting back into the routine I was more limited in my fishing, since I was limited I decided to stick close to home and fish the Eau Gallie River, since I live 3 miles from Ballard Park. I consider the Eau Gallie River to be my “home waters” since it’s the closest bigger body of water to my house, which we moved into in January. Before that we rented an apartment when we moved here in February of 2020 while we looked for a home to buy – the apartments were the ones on the river and even had a private launch spot about 2/3 of the way down the river from Ballard Park. So I have fished this river a ton, and have done it in all seasons and in a variety of ways.

I think that the Eau Gallie is an under-appreciated river, I think many people assume that it is dirty water – which is actually not true you can read more about that here…https://www.sjrwmd.com/2019/05/celebrate-a-cleaner-eau-gallie-river/

I can’t speak to what the river was like before since I moved here in the winter of 2020, but in my experience it is a scenic place to paddle, observe wildlife – a variety of birds, lots of manatees and dolphins and if you are on a paddle-board or stand up in a kayak don’t be surprised to look down and see Bull Sharks cruising by. There’s a variety of ways to fish this river for different species but today I will focus on Elbow Creek and how I fished it this weekend.

Where to Launch – Ballard Park is the only public boat ramp/launch spot with direct access to the EGR. I usually unload all of my gear and kayak close to the picnic areas and drag my loaded kayak down to the shoreline access just west of the boat ramps. I would much rather slide my kayak into the water on a natural shoreline anyway, but the boat ramps are usually crowded and there is usually a lot of tension and weird vibes going on between boaters and jet skiers rushing to get in the water and rushing each other over the ramps. Having a paddle craft I highly recommend just getting out of the frenzy and sliding into the water via the sand shoreline.

Fishing Elbow Creek – Elbow Creek is a tributary that branches off of the main EGR to the south, once it goes through the Hw1 Bridge there is a small island, if you paddle to the left you can follow a residential canal until it dead ends a few hundred yards south of the island or you can follow the creek east until it gets too shallow to continue paddling. I have not had any success fishing beyond this island. My last few trips down I stop under the bridge and get out to stretch my legs and enjoy the shade a few moments before I head back north again to the EGR.

I’ve never had any issues catching Snook along the mangroves and under docks going down the creek, I usually average around a dozen per trip but they’re mostly smaller in size. I included a photo of one I caught the other day which is about the average size I catch there – Roughly 20 inches or so. Be on the lookout for rolling tarpon as you head down and back through Elbow Creek I’ve been there twice in the last two weeks, I’ve seen them rolling each time, last weekend I caught a few and hooked up with a few more, this past weekend nothing. I did catch a dozen or so Mayan Cichlids, a few jacks and one small Redfish this past weekend. I got broken off on a bigger Snook and caught one that I guestimate to be lower slot size but he slipped out of my hands when I was getting him out of the net, so it made for a quick release and I didn’t get an exact measurement. The key to finding feeding fish is look out for wading birds, they will be stalking schools of minnows and you can always bet there are Snook somewhere close by. The beauty of fishing this creek from a kayak is getting into shallow water, and getting into holes behind docks and in cuts in the mangroves. It’s also nice to be able to get really close to the mangrove to be able to skip cast lures deep into the pockets of the overhanging trees. The water level all over the EGR and EC is low right now, and the deeper you go into the creek you will really see it, as much as it would be nice to get more consistent rain and a break from hot days and bluebird skies low water means its easier to get lures back deep into the shade pockets provided by mangroves.

What Works for Me/What Doesn’t – Most of the bait that I have seen back there is small, and since it is connected to freshwater and brackish I’m not sure that using live shrimp or shrimp lures is the most effective, To be fair I haven’t used either one So I can’t say for sure. For me the key to catching the most fish is downsizing baits. I love the DOA CAL paddle tail and if I’m not getting bit will trim a half inch or so off and I like using their smaller 1/0 Jighead 1/16 oz. If Idon’t have one I will use a regular 2/0 1/8 oz Jighead. I’ve also caught a good number of Snook, Trout and Redfish on the DOA Curly Tail Grub. My favorite colors are the Glow/Gold and Rootbeer/Gold Flake paired with a red DOA CAL jighead or a twistlock hook weedless. But if you are trimming baits down to under 3 inches it’s hard to get them on a twistlock hook. A great bait choice for Snook and Tarpon is the DOA Tiny Terror Eyez. After conducting my experiment last week on “freshwater” baits I really like the Creme 2 inch swimbait and continued to use that this weekend and catching fish off of it. No Tarpon this weekend but it is a great bait for Juvenile Tarpon as it closely resembles a Mosquito fish or small Minnow. I actually accidentlly snagged a Minnow when casting into a school of them, and thought it was really cool how slosely my bait resembled it in size and profile, I included it in my picture as well as a testament to “matching the hatch”.

Conclusion – We’re in the dog days of summer for sure, it can be tough fishing anywhere right now, and I didn’t go out and catch any trophies this weekend but I was able to catch close to 20 total fish, paddle around and enjoy being on the water. The Eau Gallie River, and Elbow Creek especially is a great place to fish from a kayak or paddleboard, and for someone wanting to catch a good number of Snook on artificials it is great, it’s like a Snook nursery back in there. If you’re looking for something different this week it can be a great way to explore some quiet backwaters, and catch a lot of hungry fish on light tackle. I haven’t caught any bigguns back there but it’s always a reliable place to get bites, and I can never complain about a day spent on the water catching fish!