Vol 3, No. 3

pulled in to the Denny’s in Englewood for dinner and then drove over to my good friend Captain Al White’s house, where I would be crashing for the next few nights.

Wednesday morning I launched the Pathfinder into Gasparilla Sound on what was supposed to be a sunny day with a slight chance of rain and a 6 mph easterly wind, but 6 mph turned into 20 mph after I had been out there for an hour or two. No problem. Living on the Georgia coast had gotten me used to 20 mph wind. On the Georgia coast, that is pretty much the minimum wind speed.

I couldn’t see the Redfish on the flats, but I did bump a few as I poled my way across the flat or drifted on the wind. Eventually, the wind and tide were getting high enough that I gave up the stalking tactic and decided to stake out next to a large shell bed with an adjacent deep hole with mixed sand and grass all around. It is easier to spot cruising fish in this area and you can blind cast the deeper water when nothing else is going on. This spot consistently produces Redfish and Sea Trout at various tide stages. It’s sort of a grab bag spot that will also attract other fish now and then. It is at the edge of the flat adjacent to a fairly major creek channel. It’s just one of those very “fishy” spots.

Once I let the wind push me half way and paddled the other half way to the shell bed, I anchored up there and went silent to let things settle back down. This is something far too few boat anglers do when anchoring up on a spot. What’s your rush? Fish have almost zero memory. Give them a few minutes and they’ll forget you showed up in a big boat, dropped an anchor, and disturbed their peace. Their wariness will disappear. That’s when you want to begin fishing. I always get a good drink and smoke a cigarette. A five to ten minute break will do the trick nicely. It’s like good camouflage. It 13