The other day I was asked if trout fishing was closed for the month, the answer is no. It is however closed for the months of November and December South of the Volusia/Flagler county line. You cannot launch your boat in Volusia county, fish in Flagler county, and bring trout back to Volusia. FWC will not listen to your reasoning if you try to do this, so be aware.
Talking of trout I can tell you this, they are all over the place right now. Fish anywhere in the ICW from Matanzas to the south end of Flagler and you’re sure to find them. They range from 14” to 25”. They’ll hit anything you throw at them. Live shrimp, live or cut mullet and artificial baits. Artificials include hard plastics such as top water and diving plugs. Soft Plastics with a paddle tail will produce extremely well as will shrimp imitations. You’ll want to use either a 1/8 oz or ¼ oz jig head when fishing these soft plastics.
The flounder bite continues to improve with the falling water temperatures. They’re taking buck tail jigs as are trout. They’ll also eating live mullet, live shrimp, mud minnows and soft plastics that are bumped across the bottom.
Mark Wagenschuner fished the Matanzas area in his kayak on Tuesday and had trout to 4 lbs on top water flies and buck tail jigs and a pompano on a fly. Mark also said there were tarpon from 20 lbs to 150 lbs at the inlet. Don’t expect the tarpon to stay around long due to the falling water temps.
Calvin, Kevin and Dan Coates fished with me last Sunday and the trio had over 25 fish. They landed a wide variety that included trout, flounder, redfish, black drum, snook, lady fish and mangrove snapper. All were on live shrimp
Mike Salzer and DeAnne and Mike Salzer Jr. fished with me and this past Tuesday and this trio also did well. They landed a bunch of trout between 14” and 20” and had a couple of keeper flounder. The fish were caught on live shrimp.
After reading about the fishing that is taking place I hope you get out to get in on the action and enjoy the weather we’ve been having lately.
Photo: Dan Coates with a blackdrum that was caught live lining a shrimp