Time for the pomps

A pompano caught, on a redfish jig, this morning.



Well, I must be honest I do not look forward to winter. I know, I don't know what winter is really is, and I really don't want to know what it is like. I prefer it to be 90 degrees in the shade! I still manage to wear my flip flops most days in the winter, but some days I have to resort to shoes. There is one good thing about the days that you have to wear shoes and that is the pompano bite is typically on. Every winter these hard fighting permit look alikes invade our area, they can be found on the beaches and on the flats of the Indian River. From late November through March is probably the best time of the year to target these guys, so today I did. Like most guides around the state business is down, but when you fish for a living like I do, you have to get your fix whether or not I have a paying customer. After getting the kids off to school I launched the boat and hit my favorite pompano flat. When I fish by myself catching fish takes the back seat, I like to just check things out and take in the day. I fish at a very slow pace and I spend more time observing than casting. One mistake I think many people make is, they do not slow down enough and pay attention to what is around them. Pay attention to the tide, the water level in general, and the contour of the bottom, try and figure out why fish are living where they live. If you do this you will catch more fish in the long run and you will truly appreciate the outdoors and what it offers. I did wear my flips today and the pompano bite was not red hot, but I did manage a couple before I got side tracked by a tri-color heron that I had to photograph. It is not easy fighting a fish with a camera around your neck shooting photos, but I did manage a couple shots of these pompano in the water.

I want to go a bit more in depth about the winter time fishing here in the south Indian River. I don't want anyone to get the wrong idea, just because I don't like winter does not mean I don't like winter time fishing. Fishing in the winter has a lot to offer, what we lack in glamour species is made up for with numbers and variety. For example when you're pompano fishing the way I do with jigs and flies there are plenty of other species to keep you busy, mainly ladyfish. If don't like ladyfish then you may not like fishing at all, sure they are messy around the boat but they bite good, fight hard, and jump. I always tell my clients if you are good at catching ladyfish you will be good at catching about anything else, what other fish outside of tarpon is harder to actually bring to the boat without throwing the hook? In addition to the ladyfish and pompano game, the colder temperature really turns on the trout bite. Again, they are typically smaller then in the warmer months but when you feel that thump of a trout bite 30 or more times in a morning, you really forget about their size. If the beach is calm as reported the other day spanish mackerel fishing is off the charts, read my mackerel post for more. With all that said you can still catch the more glamorous snook, tarpon, and redfish, but take winter time for what it is worth. Catching loads of fish in flip flops while others are shoveling snow, where would you rather be?

check out my fishing webpage http://stuartflyfishing.com/
check out my photography webpage http://pbase.com/stuartflyfishing

Sigma 120-400mm OS birds

If you read my post about pompano you know that I didn't get much fishing in because,I got side tracked by a tri-color heron. I just had to test out my new Sigma 120-400mm OS lens. So far so good, I am not used to using such a long lens and when the boat is rocking it is sometimes hard to keep stable, but with the help of the OS (optical stabilizer) I was able to capture some pretty good shots with so so lighting. I know if I would have got out of the boat I could have got some sharper images but all in all I was happy with the results. If there is a downfall to this lense, it is the fact that the OS makes noise while it is working, a little bothersome at first but I am getting used to it. Please do not take this post as a review of this lens, I am in no position to review any lens. I just enjoy taking photos and occasionally I am lucky enough to sell a few, but believe me I am a far better fishing guide then photographer. Speaking of selling some photos, when I got in from fishing or picture taking or whatever you want to call it I do out here, I was greeted with a package. I recieved my prints I ordered a few days ago, they are 16X20 on Kodak Metallic paper, and I was extremely impressed with the quality of the prints. The metallic paper gives the print a very cool artistic look. I will have another post that will show what images I have prints of and if anyone is interested in ordering some you can send me an email. Sorry I got side tracked again. Anyway, enjoy these bird shots they were all taken this morning on my new Sigma 120-400mm OS.

check out my fishing webpage http://stuartflyfishing.com/
check out my photography webpage http://pbase.com/stuartflyfishing

Stay Hooked- become a fan of this blog

The best thing about having this public blog is that not only do I have an opportunity to share stories and photos with my clients, but that fisherman and photographers from around the world can get involved and interact. If you have found this blog and you enjoyed reading it or just looking at the photos please sign in as a follower. This will give me a chance to get to know everyone that is a fan of my blog. As an incentive anyone that signs in as a follower of this blog, I will mail you one of my new oval fly logo decals for free. You can put it on your skiff, your drift boat, your fly box, your camera case, your truck, or like I did my wife's mini wan. (It makes the minivan much cooler!) It is a very cool decal that will tell everyone you like to fly fish. I posted a picture of the logo with this post so you can check it out. Just email me the address that you want it mailed to. My email address is info@stuartflyfishing.com

proof of the one on the minivan

check out my fishing web page http://stuartflyfishing.com/
check out my photography web page http://pbase.com/stuartflyfishing

Holy Mackerel

I bet who ever coined the term "Holy Mackerel!" was fishing in Stuart, Florida during the winter. You see every winter spanish mackerel move into an area on our beaches that is known as Peck's Lake, or just simply the mackerel hole. I have been told that this is the largest concentration of spanish mackerel in the country, and since I have been fishing the hole for over 20 years I personally would agree. Now this is no secret among locals, you will be fishing among hundreds of boats, some trolling (who knows why?), some throwing jigs, some flyfishing, and even plenty of commercial boats throwing cast nets on them. Yes, that is how many mackerel are there. It is not uncommon to catch over a hundred fish on flies or jigs in a single morning, and the commercial guys may pull in 1500lbs. a day on a good day. Now to some of you reading this it may not seem like fun being surrounded by boats catching mackerel, but anyone who has done it will disagree. This morning on my charter I fished with a good client of mine Ken Stockwell and 3 of his friends, all are from Michigan, we needed two boats so I asked my friend Capt. Scott Cormier to help me with the charter. I had Ken and his friend Kirk Squiers on my boat, now Ken has fished the mackerel hole with me in years past and as soon as he knew the ocean was calm today he knew he wanted to head down to the mackerel hole. We had one of those mornings, when I say we hooked them on every cast, I say it without exaggeration. When we were on top of the fish we hooked them on fly and jigs every cast! If you fly fish no matter what level caster you are you owe it to yourself to fish Peck's Lake at least once in your life. I am sorry I do not have any photos to post, but there is no way for me to take pictures while chartering for mackerel. I am too busy landing fish, rigging rods, and cleaning the boat, not to mention that there is no way I am touching my Nikon D300 with mackerel scales all over my hands. I will do my best to head out one day with a friend and just take pictures so you can see for yourself what the mackerel hole is all about. Thanks for reading,
John
http://stuartflyfishing.com/ - fishing
http://pbase.com/stuartflyfishing - photography

"one of those days"

If there is one species that Stuart lacks it's redfish, now before everyone starts mumbling under their breath, let me explain. I am not saying that Stuart does not have redfish, but compared to the snook fishing, trout fishing, and tarpon fishing, the redfish is the most difficult of the Indian River slam. However, just a short drive north can produce some of the best redfishing in the state, especially in the winter. I fished today with a friend of mine Matt Bagley, he is the mate on a brand new 86 foot Jim Smith, named the Patsea VII and it just so happens that part of his duties is to make sure that their tender a 17 Maverick HPX V is in good working order. So when Matt asked if I wanted to fish up north with him I did not have to think twice, I believe my words were "when and where?" After meeting up at the Finest Kind Marina we drove north with the Maverick in tow. On the way up our conversation turned to the surprising amount of cloud cover and the need for clear water to help combat this unfortunate circumstance. You see in order to successfully sight fish reds you have to see them! My Oakley polarized shades are killer but sunlight helps. Once at the ramp we were both happy to see clear water and no wind, two of the three ingredients, that is when I first said it's going to be one of those days. Now being the positive angler that I am, "one of those days" is a good thing.



We headed off to our first shoreline and Matt was cool enough to give me the first shot, and lucky me I had a few fish within minutes to cast at, I believe it was my third fish ate the fly. After landing that fish and Matt snapping a few photos I said,"It's going to be one of those days."





Well as quickly as things started going right, they started going wrong. I jumped on the tower after I landed my fish and it was Matt's turn on the bow. We still saw plenty of fish and we even had one eat Matt's fly shortly after he grabbed his rod, but what we didn't realize was that when Matt pulled the hook on that fish, he actually broke the hook. A few minutes went by and Matt had another fish eat his fly, and again it pulled the hook. This is when Matt realized that the hook had broke. Now, before jumping to conclusions, I did not give Matt a bad fly, you see this fly was one that Matt's good friend had given him years ago before he had passed away, and Matt wanted to catch a red in memory of his buddy, Paul. He and Matt used to fish this location quite a bit together years ago. I will tell you this the redfish loved Paul's fly. After Matt got a new fly we continued on and we noticed the water was starting to dirty, and sighting fish became harder and harder. Still with some shots but the fish just would not eat. We needed a change of local and a change of fly. Cloud cover was getting worse by the minute but the new location greeted us with cleaner water and with Matt's new fly he caught a fish within minutes of the change. I know you guys are reading this and saying, come on dude I have been reading this long winded story and you still have not told me what fly you used, okay it was a bonefish bitter, a type of MOE fly. You can buy them at Southern Angler. (there's your plug Scott)



I grabbed that fly and the first redfish I threw at ate it! The lighting sucked so the picture are not that great, but I wanted to photograph this fish. It was a nice fish we both estimated about eight to ten pounds. So I gave the fish to Matt we jumped out of the boat and I took a few shots of the fish.



Off to lunch, after a burger and a few drinks we hit a couple more shorelines. I had one more hook up on a blind cast, but the hook pulled. The water was very high and dirty at this point so we headed home. I guess you can say it was one of those days!


A couple quick notes: The Maverick HPX-V is incredible a great riding skiff that floats very shallow. Today was also the first day I got to use my new Crowder Rods 7 wt. fly rod. It is a 4 piece rod that is an excellent casting rod and retails for only $350! Many of you know that I have been using Crowder light tackle rods for a very long time and now I am happy to be using his new fly rods as well. They come in 6 through 12 weight and are built with high quality components, if you come fish with me you can try them out. Thanks for reading this long post.
John
http://Stuartflyfishing.com - fishing
http://pbase.com/stuartflyfishing - photography

building this blog

Okay, I must admit it was not too long ago that I did not understand why so many people had blogs, and for that matter I really was not even sure what a blog was. However, this old salty fly fishing guide is getting up to speed with some help of his friends. I want to thank a couple people especially Rob McAbee, ironically I met Rob through facebook because I was friends with his sister all through school, (I told you I was keeping up with the times) anyway Rob is a fly fisherman and an artist so we found we had a lot in common, and have since become friends. He has helped me in many ways, first through conversations he encouraged me to have a blog and he explained how beneficial a blog can be. Secondly, he designed the very cool header that I have on this blog, you see Rob is a graphic artist and he owns his own design company and fly fishing apparel company. I would also like to thank Mike Engelhardt, I first meet Mike 5 or 6 years ago when his dad booked me for a charter. I always enjoyed fishing with Mike, his dad Mike and his sister Julia, they are all incredibly nice people and of course good anglers. When I first guided the Engelhardts Mike and Julia were just teenagers, now they are both adults and I am starting to feel old, so I will stop. Anyway, Mike is a huge trout fisherman and he has his own blog, and he helped guide me through the process of building my blog . So I owe both of those guys a big thank you! Here are links to their web pages:
http://bugslinger.com
http://inthedrift.blogspot.com

Sunday's sunrise

Sometimes you have those mornings were the sunrise can make your whole day and Sunday morning was that day. I managed to sneak in a charter with Keith Long and his son Owen before the front hit. We enjoyed an incredible sunrise while they caught jacks, mackerel, and bluefish in the St. Lucie inlet. It is difficult to shot photos while on a charter so I did my best to capture the morning for all of you to enjoy. Soon after the sun was up the wind started blowing and we were forced to finish our trip in 20 plus MPH winds. Owen still was able to trick a few ladyfish and some more jacks before we headed in. Keith landed a snook and small grouper as well. Most fish were caught on topwater plugs and DOA shrimp, thanks again Mark! We made the best of the conditions dealt to us, for what we lacked in glamour species we made up for in numbers.

My fishing website http://stuartflyfishing.com/

My photography page http://pbase.com/stuartflyfishing