My wife Deb put in a request for a whiting and croaker dinner for tonight so the pressure was on this morning to catch some fish. Tuesday's outing was cut short by the thunder and lightning that came through in the afternoon while we were setting up at Dollmans Beachside. Randy and I managed to catch a couple of whiting before the storms hit. The highlight of the short-lived trip was an over the slot sized snook decided to eat a small pilchard I was bringing in on a sabiki bait rig. The big fish stuck her head out of the water and took everything with one big shake. Today's trip proved once again that there are days that you have to cover some ground to find the concentrations of fish. I started early this morning at the northern end of Hutchinson Island on Blue Heron beach. The bites were far and few between and stops at Middle Cove, Herman's Bay, and Normandy proved to be equally slow. I met my son Randy at Stuart Beach and walked on to find clean water and great conditions. The whiting, croaker, palometa, and even small pompano provided steady bites during the falling tide. Stuart Beach had a deep and well defined trough along the northern part of this location and the fish bit right up until noon time when we packed it in. We released as many as we kept due to their smaller size, but the action was consistent. The hot bait has been the clam-scented orange Fishbite and provided all of the bites. It is the time of year when live shrimp become impossible to get at the local tackle stores, but you will catch these fish consistently on the Fishbites. A live lined 6-inch croaker got attacked in the trough and came back to us bitten off right behind the gills. The hours surrounding the high tide mark is the best time to target these fish and I am sure if we had been there early in the morning and closer to high tide, our catch would have been better. I will be there tomorrow morning at dawn as the high tide is right around 6:30 am. Catch-and -release snook, whiting, croaker, palometa, and jacks should all be patrolling the near shore area so just pitch your baits, but do not cast them. Get your orange colored clam-scented Fishbites, put ice in your cooler and hit the beach . Good luck and catch em up!
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