It’s been an eventful week here in our beloved fishing grounds along the Matanzas River, and I’m here to share my experiences with you.
First, I want to give a shout out to my son, Elon, for landing his PB Jack on a Diawa BG 2000 (it’s a pretty small Reel). We have had no trouble finding schools of Jacks out there but this was the largest I’ve seen inshore this year.
Now, let’s talk about the abundance of finger mullet that’s still gracing our tidal creeks and the Intracoastal Waterway, thanks to the mullet run that kicked off a month ago in early September. These little guys have been a real treat for both the fish and us anglers.
However, the nor’easter that swept through our area brought its own set of challenges. Heavy winds and relentless rain made their presence known, dirtying up the waters and making it quite a task to fish during the flood tide, which coincided with the full moon. But adversity only strengthens our determination.
Speaking of challenges, the nor’easter also led to a concerning incident – 10,000 gallons of raw sewage spilled into Palm Coast’s waters from five different pump stations. It’s a stark reminder of the need for Florida’s Right to Clean Water initiative to help prevent such spills in the future. Our pristine waters are worth protecting.
Despite these hurdles, the week wasn’t a total bust. We had several tournaments over the past weekend that saw some impressive catches. I had the privilege of serving as the weigh master for one of these tournaments, where the winning redfish measured 26.75″ and weighed in at 7 pounds 1 ounce. Just for fun, there was even a 10-pound snook on the scales.
Given the conditions, most anglers turned to live shrimp, live mullet, or cut mullet on the bottom in deeper waters to entice their catch. As for me, I faced some struggles earlier in the week, but come Thursday evening, I managed to turn the tide and started reeling in slot-sized reds and even an over-slot beauty on my go-to top water lure made by Kiss My Fish the “creeper”
Now, let’s talk about flounder. The reports are still coming in, but time is running out as their season closes on October 15th. Keep an eye out for the trout bite, which should be picking up soon, along with sheepshead and black drum as the cooler weather begins to chill the waters.
Don’t despair if you’re into Tarpon and Snook; they’re still around, but as the temperatures drop, we’ll see fewer of them in our area. If you’re eager to learn more about inshore fishing in our region, consider checking out my YouTube channel, “Take a Bow with Capt. Adam Morley,” for some visual insights.
Tight lines, fellow anglers, and may your next trip be filled with memorable catches and smooth sailing.
Sunday started off the week with a Waning Gibbous moon phase which is 93 percent full. This allowed those predatory fish to feed tremendously a couple days leading up to Sunday and a couple days after Sunday. Also allowing these fish to feed longer throughout the night. The late-night trout and snook bite was going off under the dock lights and around the Palm Coast bridges. We found throwing a paddle tail style lure or an artificial shrimp style lure under a popping cork around these areas at night got the job done.
Good numbers of flounder were caught this week on the incoming tide around creek mouths and thinned out grassy areas. We found downsizing the paddle tail to a 2.5 inch paddle tail with a very slow retrieve barely off the bottom had the fatties chewing. We were finding 2-5 flounder in the same area at times. So don’t rush to move spots after hooking into a flounder. More than likely there will be more lying around. This week has been a very good week for Red Fish for us.
Days leading up into Sunday we were catching up to 15-20 Reds per day. These Reds were being caught on everything from 4 inch to 2.5 inch paddle tails and topwater plugs. We are starting to notice larger schools coming together hanging around the thinned-out grass flats early and mid-morning.
Due to the excessive rain fall and super high tides a lot of these Reds were found pushed back into those areas of flooded grass flats. We noticed a lot of these Reds that were pushed back into the flooded grass were feeding on bugs on top of the water. We switched lures to a SWL creature style fineness bait that’s weedless and threw into the grass. These Redfish would ambush these lures from under the grass kind of like retrieving an artificial bass frog across Lilly pads.
The topwater bite has been going off early in the morning on the incoming and outgoing tide around islands and thinned out grass flats. Good numbers of trout were also caught in these areas on topwater as well.
Capt. Adam Morley
904.540.7245
