SW FL-Bonita Beach: Tropical Storm Fay, then good fishing

Monday, 8/18, as Tropical Storm Fay approached and the meteorologists speculated as to her course and strength, the winds began to pick up and the seas churned in that angry way that they do just before a storm. It was time to batten down the hatches…literally. We secured the boats and turned our attention toward securing our property. Fay passed over us in the pre-dawn hours Tuesday, with some pretty hefty wind-gusts of up to 65 mph. We were fortunate to maintain electrical power but thousands in our county and neighboring counties did not. Fay was a rainmaker too and flooding was reported in many areas. Lee County schools closed Tuesday, one day after beginning their new school-year, and Collier County, due to begin school Tuesday, deferred its opening. Needless to say, fishing was the last thing on anyone’s mind and Fay’s effects precluded fishing all of that week. Even the trip we had scheduled for Monday, 8/25, deferred until Tuesday, in order to allow the Gulf waters additional time to calm. Still, we feel blessed, fortunate to have dodged another potential bullet during this hurricane season.

On Tuesday, 8/26, first day offshore after the storm, I fished with Reiner and Lisa Neumann, their son, Steven, and uncle, Dennis Hill. We had a good morning of fishing with live shrimp in 35 feet out of New Pass, where we caught twenty keeper mangrove snapper (four limits) ranging in size from 12 to 15 inches, one keeper yellowtail snapper, a 14 inch keeper triggerfish, two Spanish mackerel keepers at 23 inches and 25 inches, and a keeper red grouper at 21 inches. We released two mutton snapper to 15 ¾ inches, just a quarter inch shy of keeper-size.

The photo shown is of angler, Robert Dulberg, with a 28 ½ inch bull red, caught on shrimp and released on a recent inshore trip.