On Saturday, Tania decided she didn’t want to go fishing. She was tired from starting back to work and wanted to get stuff done around the house. Since we had invited our friend Gil, she told me to go without her. I told Gil to meet me at the dock about 6:30am. I was able to get bait and I already had ice from the day before so I arrived at the dock early, around 6:15 am.

As the dock hand was going to get my boat the key fell off the floating key chain and into the water. This delayed us getting our boat but at the end it worked out in our favor. With Friday being so rough and today being the same forecast, I wanted to fish inshore today and we ended up getting an inshore boat with a trolling motor.

Gil showed up just as the boat arrived at the dock for us to load. We loaded the boat and headed out. The plan was to run north to Harbor Branch and see if we could find any snook, redfish, or trout. It was an absolutely beautiful ride north and when we hit the slow zone, we decided to hit the spoil islands to work them the rest of the way to Harbor Branch.

We started fishing the east side of Spoil Island SL5. There was a ton of life here. Schools of bait fish were all over with the occasional blow up on them. Seeing all this action got us excited. Gil started throwing a 3 ½ paddle tail and I was throwing the Nomad Vertrex crank bait. We made it about halfway around the island without a single bite and I noticed a lot of hits on the top. With the sun still low on the horizon I switched over to the Moonwalker.

Shortly after I switched over, Gil hooked up with a small snook. Almost as soon as he released it there was a blow up right against the island and Gil casted there and hooked up immediately. I tossed the Moonwalker there and no sooner did it hit the water it was slammed. We had a double hook up on small snook. Gil pulled one more small snook out of the area before we moved over to Harbor Branch. As much as we liked catching, he small snook we were seeking their parents.

We got to Harbor Branch about 8:30 am. The sun was getting higher in the sky and boy was it getting hot and there was very little wind to cool us off. We worked the whole peninsula without a single bite. It was slightly disappointing; however, with the warmer water and the sun high in the sky we concluded the fish were in deeper waters.

At this point we headed to the channel and started fishing near the channel makers. Gil was hoping to get some fish to take home. We worked the channel all the way back to North Causeway bridge and all we landed were short snapper. We had a couple nice 15-inch mutton snapper, which were fun to catch, but not legal to put into the cooler. We also had a couple of larger fish which broke us off before we could see what they were.

About 11:00 am we headed to the east wall south of South Causeway Bridge. We fished here until we ran out of live shrimp. We once again just caught short snapper and a few catfish. We made it back to the dock about 11:45 am with an empty cooler.

Even though we came home empty handed, it was great fishing with Gil. We haven’t fished together in probably 6 months. I was grateful to be able to catch up with a good friend and spend the morning on the water. Tania and I pray all who made it out so far this week had safe and blessed trips. May those who are heading out the rest of the week have tight lines and good times!

The Treasure Coast Chapter of Salt Strong is now holding monthly meetings in Fort Pierce. The meetings are being held on the 4^th Thursday of the month. The next meeting will be August 24^th. These club meeting are for inside members only. If you would like to become an inside member here is what the membership includes: access to the in-person meetings as well as all the other perks such as 20% off all tackle, Smart Fishing spots, and insider information on trends in your area. We will also have guest speakers at our meetings and we will be holding monthly tournaments. Click the link below to get a FREE pack of slam shady or a 10-Day Test-Drive of The Smart Fishing Spots App and The Salt Strong Insider Club . . . And We’ll Ship You $35 Worth of FREE Lures, an “Inshore Fishing Manifesto” Book (Physical copy) & Decals – Yours to Keep Even If You Cancel!