Fall is in the Air

 We are steadily approaching my favorite time of year. Sorry I have been so bad about keeping up to date with these post, so I will just sum up the last few months. This summer was a hot one followed by an active hurricane season. There has been plenty of redfish and snook around the backcountry. They always seemed to be most active at first light before the water temp started heating up. With the first cold front coming through last week the fish have become much more active. The trout are starting to come back inshore and there have been some monster redfish showing up in the shallows with them. If you are fly fishing, patterns like the gurgler or a big popper have been ideal for redfish and snook. Also throwing shrimp sliders or some sort of crustacean pattern have been effective at higher tides, schools of mullet around the mangroves are always a good place to look. 

Spring Time Fishing

Spring as arrived!  Weather has been warming up and so has the bite.  Springtime here on the Nature Coast offers some of the best sight fishing opportunities in Florida.  redfish and snook have been VERY active in the backcountry, with both being caught on fly and artificial.  If you like throwing the fly rod like myself, it is hard to beat patterns like the gurgler, EP minnow, or the classic clouser minnow.  My favorite time to target the big redfish has been on extremely low tides.  This usually pushes them out of the mangroves and onto the flats where you will find them tailing.  I like to use a quiet approach with my push pole and make long cast.  If you would rather throw artificial, I suggest using topwater baits or weightless jerk baits.  Look for areas that have a lot of bait, I try and fish areas where I see lots of mullet and pinfish.  Spring also means the tarpon will start showing up soon.  If you ever wanted to do battle with a monster tarpon on fly, there is no better place than the Nature Coast.