Report for Naples, Marco Island and the Ten Thousand Islands

Winter Bonus The weather in Southwest Florida has been for the most part, unseasonably gracious to us. So has the fishing. This time of year, we start concentrating on trout, sheepshead, ladyfish and the occasional redfish and snook. Normally we have back to back cold fronts blasting through Florida. Yes, we have had a few. This last cold front put the water temperature into the lower sixties. That is not normally good for catching snook. Warm weather has made for a quick recovery. I have been having a few double digit days with snook and redfish since Christmas using popping corks and shrimp. I have also been using quarter ounce jigs with Hybrid bodies on them. Black Drum, sheepshead, ladyfish and plenty of trout have been rounding out the day. When the water did get cold, I had my anglers fish in deeper water with live shrimp and just enough split shot to get the bait down. This method has been producing some good catches of all of the above species. It is not uncommon to snatch a fine gag grouper to boot. There will be continuing cold fronts. That is the nature of the beast when it comes to winter fishing. But the catching has been super. Come gets some. I’ll see you on the water.