Shore Fishing

Windy Days For Shore Fishing

It doesn’t take much wind to blow kayaks off the bay. We are cautious about kayak fishing on days where the wind is from the north or south and whitecaps take over Lemon Bay and most other north/south oriented waters. There are still spots to fish and escape the wind, but these places are more limited than on those days with the wind out of the east or west. Folks around here know that a sea breeze blows most afternoons, even on those days that start with an easterly wind. Be prepared to switch lee sides on the bay as this sea breeze develops. That means crossing Lemon Bay twice, so pick a narrow spot like Oyster Creek or Lemon Bay Park to start and end your day. Or launch at Blind Pass and deal with the wind until the sea breeze kicks in.

Of course, shore fishing is an alternative on windy days. That includes both salt and freshwater spots. The persistent red tide has finally diminished and blown out to sea. This opens up the beaches for anglers hoping to find live fish. Many fish died but lots of them survived and are again showing up along our beaches. There are a couple of things you need to know first.

One thing is that Florida beaches are public property but only up to the high tide line. So, just stay down by the water on the wet or smooth sand to avoid conflicts with beach properties that claim a private beach.  Your best access points are public beaches where you can park, get to the water and fish, avoiding swimmers while also avoiding private properties.

Another thing we want folks to know as they visit our beaches this spring is to wear protective footwear on the dry sand areas. After Hurricane Ian, lots of debris including broken glass, metal, nails, and screws littered the beach and not all of it has been found and removed. Another hazard requiring sandals is the presence of dead fish skeletons from the red tide event we recently experienced. Lying partially buried in the sand, needle sharp fish bones can poke you with putrefied, bacteria covered stuff you really don’t want to deal with.

Even though the red tide has dissipated, it still caused a mass die off of fish at all levels in the food chain. Starting with sand fleas and coquina at the bottom of the food chain, which were nearly wiped out. It will take time for the surf to scrub the sand of toxins so these organisms can return. Until then, bring shrimp or blanched sand fleas from the bait store if you’re planning a fish fry, though we encourage catch and release to help our fish populations recover.

We recently began a search of good, accessible bass lakes in this area for shore fishing and were surprised at the number of bass in the ponds at Ann Dever Regional Park off of San Casa Drive. The pond south of the swimming pool was the best, but mostly smaller fish were released. We were encouraged though and plan to return soon to find the larger bass that must be there too. Due to the vegetation on the bottom of these ponds, a lightly weighted or unweighted plastic worm rigged weedless was a good choice in the middle of the day. At sunset, there was more surface activity suggesting a popping bug with a fly rod might be something else to try.