Tampa Bay to Sarasota, FLORIDA

    Capt. Shawn Crawford and Capt. Matt Ercoli have had some pretty good days the past week or so. The Snook action has really been incredible. With the water temperature falling to below 72 degrees, it has brought big pods of nice Snook onto the flats surrounding the main passes. The advantages of these Snook are that they have been offshore since June and haven't been bombarded by anglers. I call these dumb Snook. These fish are just hanging around potholes waiting for an easy meal. You never know how many or how big these fish will be. Yesterday I had the pleasure of taking a good friend of mine, Daryl Brown, fishing. Daryl was taking his mother Snook fishing for her birthday. What a son, I really wanted to get on some good fish for them. We went to where I had spotted some good fish the day before, only to see another boat sitting right where I knew there where Snook laying. I eased up a few hundred yards from the other boat and dropped my anchor. I proceeded to tell Daryl that the other angler was drifting across the flat Trout fishing and probably didn't realize that there were Snook right behind his boat. If he would have turned and cast the other way he might have been pleasantly surprised, but being the nice guy that I am, I just let him drift on by. Once he was off in the distance, I pulled my anchor and eased up-wind from the potholes and waited until we were in casting range. I then slid my anchor over the back of the boat to get ready for the action. If I'm not mistaken, it was the second cast his mother made when all of a sudden the water erupted, with line screaming off her reel she landed the first Snook of the day. Now it was a competition to see who was going catch the most fish. That day we had a great day with a total of 18 Snook, 5 Red Fish, a 26 inch Trout, and a whole lot of Jack Cravel. I am pleased to announce that mom had won the challenge. Besides Snook action, there were a lot of Spanish Mackerel and on the beach there were also Tiny Tuna. Watch for diving birds and cast a live sardine or a silver spoon to the commotion and more often than not you will have a nice fight on your hands. We have heard reports from our offshore buddies that the King Fish are really thick out there, just a few miles off the beach. One captain told us that they couldn't catch Kings because of the large Red Fish getting to the baits before the Kings had a chance to. I mean these are big Red Fish ranging 50 to 60 inches. A lot of the stuff hasn't changed since our last report other than the improvement of the Snook action. I think the fishing will only get better as we get closer to winter. This fall has been a good one and I think with all the new laws and regulations our fishing is only going to get better. I now turn you over to Capt. Matt.

    I'm going to make this report sweet but short, I'm in a hurry and packing to go deer hunting for a couple of days. The fishing has been quite good for the fly fisherman and live bait enthusiast alike. The main target has been Snook, Snook and more Snook. With average days of landing between 20 and 30 fish on live bait, and half a dozen or more on the fly. I really believe that I can see a positive effect on our Snook population due to the new laws placed in effect just a short year ago. So if you would like to go after Florida's most popular game fish, give my partner or myself a call because the action doesn't get any better than it is right now.

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