October ended with a very strong bite. Most guides and anglers that I spoke with have been reporting excellent catches of snook and redfish. There are good numbers of fish in the back country and still some very larger fish on the outside. Bait remains plentiful near shore keeping the action hot. November is shaping up well with mild weather forecasted for a while. Once the cool fronts change to cold, things will tighten up a bit …

In the last couple of weeks, the big snook have been hitting top water “walkers” consistently. It seems the faster the plug is walked the better they seemed to like it. The bite has almost always occurred early in the retrieve as, the fish have not been following the bait at all. They have been hitting is just as it begins to move. Unlike in the warmer months, when you can see the fish follow the bait seemingly trying to decide whether or not to eat it, these late October, early November fish make their decision very quickly and race to the bait. Make long casts to your hot spot, walk (or run) the bait about 20 feet and then pick it up for the next cast. On the days with good clarity, we have been covering a lot of water presenting the baits but just a few times in a single spot. The fish know that the bait is there and they have been coming after it. When the wind has turned west and south, making the water more turbid, spending a little more time in a spot has been the trick.

With ample supply of bait, it has been hard to anglers focused on the artificial baits. Most want to pick up a scoop or two of “volunteers”. The live bait fishing is much more relaxed, but no more productive in recent weeks. Although on a recent fly fishing trip, a handful of little hunters release next to a little mangrove pocket, turned on a pile of fish that we could get to eat our flies until they were “stimulated” a bit.

I took a week off for a bit of hunting in Central Georgia. Good idea. The weather was beautiful. There was deer sign all over the place. My good friends were there (the real reason I “hunt”). It had the makings of a great trip.

The first morning, I “awoke” in my favorite stand over looking a beautiful peanut field. At first light, I had about 30 turkeys in my sites (oops not turkey season). A coyote popped his out after the turkeys left the field (I am not coyote hunting). The bobcat family and the raccoon family were to follow … no deer. I had planned to be there for a week, but three days of wildlife observation and bologna sandwiches was enough for me. I headed home. It was dry and warm … Bad Choice of timing. I will be back …

Still on vacation, Vickie and got a wild hare, hastily loaded up our camping gear and blasted off to Sugarloaf Key Good idea!! I forgot the tent poles!!! Ooops, now it is a bad idea!! We figured out that the forty million people that were crowded on the Key must be there for a reason … Yep … Fantasy Fest!!! … Agh!! It was getting worse …bad choice of timing … again. But, Fantasy Fest turned out to be quite a story in itself …I have to get this good-bad thing figured out.