Innholdsfortegnelse for March 2021 i Florida Sportsman

Here at Florida Sportsman, we mostly agree that a picture is worth a thousand words. But same as you, we like to know the backstory. When a fisherman sends us a great photo of a big catch, invariably our first response is, “Thank you! Now can you tell us a little more?” Perhaps the successful angler will reveal some interesting technique he or she used. Or maybe notes about date, tide and water temp, shedding light on a migration in progress. Whether the person is an “expert” or not, undoubtably they have something worthwhile to share. (Among the best captains and anglers I’ve known, a common trait: They listen… to everyone.) We’ve long celebrated photo field reports in our Action Spotter department in the magazine, and in recent years we’ve…

The main gate is located on the west side of US 19 just north of Centralia Rd. Chazz is open to the public year round. During non-hunting periods, visitors are allowed from 1½ hours before sunrise until 1½ hours after sunset. During hunting periods, access is allowed any time. HUNTING OPPORTUNITIES Spring turkey hunts are available through the quota hunt system. Applications are posted each November. Applications for certain deer and hog hunts are available in late-spring, though there are walk-in hunts, too. For information on limited entry hunts, visit MyFWC.com and select Hunting from the pulldown below Things to Do. BOAT RAMPS A public boat ramp is located at the Chassahowitzka River Campground (8600 W Miss Maggie Drive, 34448). Use of the ramp is free but a small fee…

4 – 5 lbs. deboned wild boar roast ¼ cup paprika 2 tbsp. olive oil (x 2) 1 large onion chopped 3 garlic cloves crushed 1 cup chopped celery 1 cup chopped carrots 1 tsp. red pepper flakes 2 cups chopped portabello mushrooms 1 can crushed low salt tomatoes 2 cups sweet and spicy BBQ sauce 1 cup soy sauce Chicken or beef stock Salt and pepper to taste Rub the paprika into the roast. Add 2 tbsp olive oil into a hot skillet and brown the roast on all sides on a medium heat. You can use bone in if preferred but you will need to increase cooking time in the slow cooker. While roast is browning, turn slow cooker to high and add olive oil and next 6…

Snook and striped bass: Perhaps nowhere on earth but the St. Johns River at Jacksonville, Florida, will you find these two heralded sportfish coexisting. The St. Johns is a unique watershed where fish of northern (temperate) and southern (subtropical) climates commonly intersect. From the angler’s perspective, it’s the best of both worlds. The snook-striper combination is one of Florida’s most exciting angling prospects. Metropolitan Jacksonville, which sprawls along both sides of the river as it bends toward the Atlantic Ocean at Mayport, overlooks riverine habitat where a deepwater port and numerous tributaries offer seasonal refuges for snook, evolved to favor water temps above 70 degrees, and stripers, which prefer much cooler water than normally found along the Florida Peninsula. Veteran Jacksonville guide Capt. Chris Holleman describes the local snook fishery…

Water and land “hunting” opportunities make Florida a sportsman’s paradise, but less known is that the fairly consistent climate makes Florida a gatherer’s paradise as well. Like fishing and hunting, collecting food from wild sources fulfills an innate drive and provides an excellent opportunity for immersion in the outdoors. While some foraging is seasonal, each season offers an abundance of species, many of which can also be harvested year around. First, be sure that the landowner or manager permits taking natural products. Florida Wildlife Management Areas (WMAs) are generally off-limits to foraging without some specific authorization from the FWC Executive Director. Similar rules govern our state and federal parks. Perhaps in the near future state and federal land-managers will make some concessions, but for now this article deals primarily with…

Captain Matt Sturdivent of Old Florida Angling Guide Services sent this recent picture of himself and his girlfriend, Brooke Thompson, with a black drum weighing 27 pounds. Sturdivent guides in the Naples, 10,000 Islands and Everglades National Park waters. He is one of the weekly online Fishing Forecast contributors at www.floridasportsman.com If past spring records are any indication, Sturdivent and other Forecasters will have reports of excellent drum fishing. The fish school up for spawning this time of year. A bronze mass of adult drum might be seen charging along a sandy beach. A quiet backcountry redfish flat could ripple with a half-acre school on the move. These fish are sometimes hesitant to bite, but if you cast them a large fresh shrimp on a jig, a weighted chunk of…

Love Is in the Water For many of the most sought-after species, spring spawns gather fish on many of the Keys reefs. These large biomasses can greatly increase your chances of catching some of the legendary species, like permit, inshore, and the sailfish wolf packs offshore heading back north after their spawn gathering off the Yucatan peninsula. This migrating pattern gives the Florida Keys an amazing sailfish bite that can rival the Central American bite, with many boats having double digits catches. Springtime fishing in the Florida Keys is world class and that fact is well-known to the international angling community. Most seasoned fishing guides are booked a year in advance. March marks the kickoff to the spring fishing season, but you must keep an eye on the wind forecast,…

Spring Migrations Full of Surprises It’s a “grab-bag” kind of month come March. There’s still some wintertime fish hanging around such as pompano and Spanish mackerel. But on a warm day, you may find some fish getting into their spring rituals, such as early season tarpon pushing through and permit holding on the wrecks. Weather patterns tend to dictate these fish movements, but don’t dismiss either option. Whether it is 50 degrees or 90, fish will surprise you. If jumbo snook get you excited, now is a great time to target these bruisers. Warming water is key to waking these big fish out of their wintertime slumber around deep structure such as bridges and channels. Once that water hits 70 degrees, especially on a sunny day, snook will work their…

Right Reefs, Right Rigs, Right Bait I consider sheepshead fishing to be “meat fishing” rather than “sport fishing.” There is some hunting and technical skill involved, but for the most part those big spawning female sheepshead are pretty easy to catch. Fishing for this “meat fish” requires meat for bait. In the last 50 years I’ve only seen one small sheepshead attack a topwater plug in shallow water. This species feeds primarily on crustaceans, like shrimp and small crabs, so some of you “artificial only” purists might need to change your game. The aforementioned female sheepshead gather around structure to advertise their wares to smaller males. Big rocky reefs are generally the best place to begin your search, but random small rock piles or lone pilings may surprise you. To…

Spring into Great Fishing Northwest Florida may be cold by peninsular Florida standards, but we’re a lot better off than fishermen in northern states still wearing down jackets. By March, we are able to fish in short sleeves many days. We also have a lot of fishing choices that don’t involve ice. March sees the saltwater migratory species returning and some of the first to show up are the Spanish mackerel. If you can find them, they are probably hungry. They typically follow the large schools of baitfish that also move inshore as the water warms. These might be glass minnows, anchovies, sardines, small menhaden or other loosely categorized white bait. If they are on the surface and birds are diving, it’s likely the Spanish mackerel are underneath them. It’s…

Prime Time for Yellowfin Tuna The range of the western Atlantic yellowfin tuna does include all of Florida. But if we are being honest, the tuna fishing days that we dream about—vast schools that might hold 150-pound-plus bruisers—are most likely encountered in waters that require a passport. A destination fishing trip that targets yellowfin? Count me in. With just a little when and where knowledge, all we need to really focus on for preparation is selecting a local charter service, and ensuring we are prepared for any new public health travel requirements. I’ve dreamed about catching giant yellowfin since I first started reading Florida Sportsman articles about it as a youngster while visiting my grandpa. I envisioned stringers with bluegill-like numbers, each fish bigger than me. Little did I know…

Erika Almond is on a mission to empower others, particularly women, to gain confidence through fishing—and to give back to the community. A native of Gainesville, Erika was the first in her family to attend college. After graduating from the University of Florida, she worked in elementary education for 20 years, but a passion for saltwater fishing has recently changed her course. Erika is now dedicated to bettering her community through fishing, starting in her town of St. Petersburg, Florida. Some of the many things on her plate include organizing tournaments, collaborating with charities, managing a clothing company, arranging weekly ladies’ trips, all on top of being a wife and mother of two, a full-time job of its own. “When my ladies group started fishing, we hired captains,” she said.…

In 1763 the Dismal Swamp Company was founded to drain, tame and make profitable the low-lying swampland in and around Washington D.C. One of the shareholders was none other than George Washington, our nation’s first president. Reading this I realized that the “over-drainage” of our wetlands is anything but new, chugging into existence nearly 260 years ago and our swamps haven’t been safe since. In an ironic twist, the metaphor of draining the swamp has been viewed as a rallying cry when it pertained to ridding corruption or government waste. But, as we see now, the actual draining of the swamp is at the very root of our water quality woes. Today, for this column, let’s settle for the metaphorical and not the literal. If we can’t rid Tallahassee of…

Florida anglers may not know this, but Texans are famous for wading out shoulder deep along the beach, firing heavy spoons as far as they can, trying to reach green water where trout feed. Their inshore break may be muddy, worthless water. The older-timers, a few years before me, swore by the Dixie spoon, and strung ponderous stringers of trout; there were no limits back then. One of them is friend Joe Doggett, retired outdoor writer for the Houston Chronicle, who had plenty of kind things to say about Dixie spoons: “The 3/4 -ounce Dixie Jet was a ‘killer bait’ in the surf during the late ‘60s and ‘70s, mainly because it has great ballistics into the wind and retrieves with authority amid waves and current. Better look and action…

Offshore, Flats, Fresh The spring migration is underway. Schools of mullet again are on the move and hot on their tails are large predators. Now is the time to catch some of the biggest smoker kings of the season, dolphin over 50 pounds, sailfish over 50 pounds, blackfin tuna to 30 pounds, Spanish mackerel to eight pounds, and bluefish that might weigh 20-plus! And this is only the offshore migrating fish. On the inshore waters of Biscayne Bay, Spanish mackerel, bluefish, jack crevalle, ladyfish, pompano, tarpon, snook and seatrout are feeding on the smaller baitfish schools. The flats fishermen will not be left out with big schools of hungry bonefish and small groups of permit, tarpon and barracudas in the mix. Freshwater fishermen, too, will have some of the year’s…

Drop on the Rocks, Then Drift the Grassflats March brings the peak of the sheepshead fishery in SW Florida. Winter sheepshead like structure and the more structure, the more sheepshead. Big structures such as the rock jetties at the Venice Inlet or the old Phosphate Dock fishing reef at Boca Grande Pass hold thousands of sheepshead and get lots of fishing attention. But we don’t need thousands of sheepshead to have a great sheepshead trip, especially when two dozen fish fills a three-person bag limit. Smaller structures such as outcrops of beach rock, bridge pilings, or almost any of the hundreds of docks along the ICW can hold enough sheepies to easily fill a cooler. Fiddler crabs and sand fleas are prime baits but plenty of sheepshead are taken on…

Cobes at the Cape When the spring cobia run kicks in, Ponce and Sebastian inlets draw their shares of the cobia crowd, but nothing like Canaveral. Once the word spreads, Canaveral is a direct Beach Line shot for metropolitan Orlando anglers who join up with their coastal counterparts. A spacious staging and launch area at Canaveral’s Freddie Patrick Park puts boaters less than a mile from the open Atlantic. Another plus for Canaveral is the 44-foot deep ship’s channel that extends 3 ½ miles offshore. The 400-foot wide channel can be a magnet for assorted baitfish, and the series of chained buoys that mark the channel become attractors for cobia as well as tripletail. In order for the spring inshore cobia to materialize in numbers we’ll need calm seas, a…

THE HUNTINGTON DRONE SPOON has been around for ages, and remains a very popular and effective lure for many coastal and offshore species found around Florida. The larger sizes work very well for wahoo, mahimahi and other species when trolled behind a planer or down-rigger along bluewater rips and drop-offs in 100 to 400 feet of water. But perhaps the most common application is in the coastal mackerel fisheries. Ben Hartig is a Southeast Florida hook-and-line commercial fisherman and longtime advisor to the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council. Hartig says he recalls the Drone spoon was a producer as far back as the late 1950s, from partyboats. “In my personal fishing experience the Drone spoon was and continues to be an integral part in targeting king mackerel, especially in winter…

Right at the coastal border of Florida and Alabama, many things look much the same. The sand is white, the water emerald green, and the tourists turn red in the sun. However, Sunshine State anglers might want to think about taking a little run to the west to Alabama to visit its massive, productive Mobile Bay region for a change of pace and some very good fishing. From Pensacola to the mouth of Mobile Bay is not a long run, either by truck and trailer or by boat through the Intracoastal Waterway. The only bad thing about an ICW trip to the Mobile Bay area is that several no-wake zones can make a boat trip drag on. Of course, boaters can run the beaches on the Gulf side and be…

WE WELCOME your fishing and hunting photos for publication in the Action Spotter and in our online community galleries at www.floridasportsman.com. SEND DIGITAL PICTURES , 600 KB to 1 MB in jpeg format. For smartphone photos, email the Actual Size—highest resolution. Images must not have appeared or been submitted elsewhere. Send photos to: photos@floridasportsman.com. INCLUDE NAMES of people pictured, hometowns, location of catch and any key details, such as weight of big catches.…

Fish the Moving Water—and Move with the Fish March is a transition month in the 10,000 Islands as the weather evolves from weekly winter cold fronts and strong winds to waning winds, warming waters and warmer daytime air temps. With that transition, fish will be on the move with more regularity, so if fishing multiple days in a row or every weekend, do not be surprised to find a “here one day and gone the next” dynamic. If you find yourself in this situation, look for the similar structure not far from where you originally caught them. The snook will begin to move from their winter haunts and become more active as the water temperatures rise and stable conditions settle into the region. Focus on transition areas, such as the…

Mix of Great Fishing, Inshore and Off With the rising water temperature, bait schools begin to show at the edges of the Gulf and begin pushing inside passes. Migratory species are ravenous, feeding on whatever forage they can find. Spanish mackerel follow bait schools along the beaches and inside passes to feast. The first showing of kingfish on offshore wrecks and artificial reefs is a sure sign that spring has arrived. Bluewater pelagics like blackfin tuna increase in numbers over the Florida Middle Grounds. While many vessels are not equipped to make the 70-plus mile runs to the grounds, some of the go-fast boats can do it in short order. If you don’t have access to one of those boats, some partyboats such as those running out of Hubbard’s Marina…

Bass on the Beds, Wahoo on the Ledge March reminds me so much of my high school love life. I saw lots and lots of pretty girls, but the “weather” was never quite right for me to get close to one. March is historically our windiest month, and anglers from Lake Crescent to the Gulf Stream will spend more days than not cursing the wind. I’ll never forget last March when Capt. Jeff Crabtree and I sat out a two-week blow, grabbed one calm day, released an even dozen sails, and sat out another two-week blow. Largemouth hunters wait all year for March. It’s always fascinated me that double-digit sized bass swim in our lakes 365 days a year. But March is the month they are the most susceptible to…

Surf Fishing, Cobia, Tunas Are a Few Highlights March is basically the entire year wrapped into one month. The weather, winds, and seas can be all over the place. It can be cold, hot, windy, calm, rough, flat and anything in between. Finding a window that matches up with your work schedule will be the toughest part. Hunting season has wrapped up for the most part with the exception of the upcoming spring turkey season, and now is a great time to start planning for next season. When it comes to fishing March, it’s all about capitalizing on the weather and the bite. The best bets will be early whiting and pompano on the beach, cobia 1 to 3 miles off the beach and around wrecks in water under 100…