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Last trip of the year for me. The water is getting cooler here in Florida and the redfish and trout will be moving off the grassbeds soon. I went out with a friend today and caught 2 below slot seatrout 13" and 14 1/2". I did manage to boat a keeper flounder though. It's the 1st flounder that I have ever caught. Maybe next year I will really get into this tubing since I sold my boat last month and don't see a new one in the future anytime soon.
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awesome.. great looking fish..
MaFly [cool]
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[cool][#0000ff]Good report. Congrats on the flattie. Are you fishing on the Atlantic or Gulf Coast?[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Used to get some bodacious reds and trout in the Indian River area. Flounders are often a byproduct. They hit the same stuff you throw for the other fish. But, they are good eating. Just don't try to lip one like a bass. TEETH.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Your tube looks like a fishing machine.[/#0000ff]
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Thanx TubeDude. I am on the Gulf Coast along the panhandle. My friend got me into wade fishing for trout and reds but I figured there had to be a better way so I decided to try tubing. I am hooked now. I am going to spend the winter coming up with a fishfinder and transducer mount for my boat. I currenlt stay in water no deeper than 7' due to the bull sharks in the bays here but want to venture into the deep water channels for some grouper or snapper action.
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Nice fish! Good job on the tube customizing too!![cool]
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Nice !!! keep it coming.
I lived in West Palm Beach for a little bid of time and
let me tell you that fishing was just GREAT. Even just
right of the beach.
Keep up the the good work.
Peter
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[cool][#0000ff]Great fishing all around the coast there. Love the Panama City area.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]BUT...you really gotta be nuts to tube in that area. Bull sharks and lemon sharks both come into very shallow water. I am sure you have seen them while wade fishing. Lemon sharks are not nearly as dangerous but they have been known to bite folks, especially if they are dragging some fish on a stringer. And bull sharks are responsible for more attacks every year than great whites. There also used to be a few tiger sharks in the area. They come in very close at night but not as much during the daytime. They get BIG and they are fearless.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]I have never tubed that area just because of the sharks. I had enough problems with them even in a large boat. There were places where we could not fish because everything we hooked got "hit" by bull sharks. I would not have wanted to be IN the water, even in a steel float tube.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Be careful and be safe. Hopefully we will read lots more posts from you...without teeth marks.[/#0000ff]
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Yeah I am very mindful of the sharks. We fish the intercoastal, Choctawhatchee Bay, and Pensacola Bay. I haven't been out in the Gulf with the tube at all and wouldn't even consider it. There are lots of flats around Hurlburt Field that are just loaded with redfish that we like to fish as well. Even though I haven't seen any sharks in the bays I'm sure that they are there. We never drag stringers along, always opting to return to shore and place the catch on ice. I keep my catch in my cooler attached to the tube unless it is a big redfish which won't fit in the cooler. Those I have to take to shore. We usually fish with live finger mullet or butterflied pinfish. The flats that we fish are shallow for hundreds of yards even at high tide so any shark would be seen pretty early finning the surface. The spot near pensacola on the map is the only area that I fear for sharks because it gets deep pretty quick.
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I am so jealous. Florida is the only gulf state that only allows 1 redfish and 5 trout per day. I have been with friends and had to release several redfish each. When they are hitting it's almost impossible to catch anything else.
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Very good points, TD.
I have similar experiences in the areas around Port Aransas, Tx. I have seen 5' sharks travel at extremely high speed picking off small bait under the pier lights at night. They don't even slow down to test or chew in the 2' -4' water unlike bigger sharks, but make rapid sweeps and head back out into the dark before you even know what happened. Even very heavy line is cut or snapped under such force, and I have seen tackle torn loose and lost.
Definately don't want to carry fish on a stringer, even during daylight. Your feet and legs need to be out the water at depths over 2' on a foot rest in a pontoon (not a tube) made of solid material rather than inflatable. I used high density foam for pontoons in these cases. There is great advantage using this method when the flounder are running as the flats will be covered almost solid with them. You can avoid sting ray hazards and do some gigging with lights or regular fishing using such a setup without going very deep and I was lucky to never have a problem with sharks.
The safest, simplest way was to wait for a tanker to pass through the channel at port A during the November run. This causes up to 3' of water behind to be sucked away from the flats bordering the channel, exposing the flapping flounder. Crowds of gigers would then move in rapidly and pick them off quickly before the large trailing wave would flood the shallows again.
Porta
[quote TubeDude][cool][#0000ff]Great fishing all around the coast there. Love the Panama City area.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]BUT...you really gotta be nuts to tube in that area. Bull sharks and lemon sharks both come into very shallow water. I am sure you have seen them while wade fishing. Lemon sharks are not nearly as dangerous but they have been known to bite folks, especially if they are dragging some fish on a stringer. And bull sharks are responsible for more attacks every year than great whites. There also used to be a few tiger sharks in the area. They come in very close at night but not as much during the daytime. They get BIG and they are fearless.[/#0000ff]
[#0000ff][/#0000ff]
[#0000ff]I have never tubed that area just because of the sharks. I had enough problems with them even in a large boat. There were places where we could not fish because everything we hooked got "hit" by bull sharks. I would not have wanted to be IN the water, even in a steel float tube.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Be careful and be safe. Hopefully we will read lots more posts from you...without teeth marks.[/#0000ff][/quote]
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