Saturday started as a scouting trip to the Little Manatee River but that all changed at O’Neill’s Marina. Captain Mark Thomas had a charter and when his group arrived with a party of 7 he needed a second boat. Captain Steven was the lucky recipient of a last second charter.
I quickly purchased more shrimp and off we went….actually not as my motor was dead. 30 minutes and lots of help later the problem was discovered a simple 20 amp fuse on my Yamaha 4 stoke blew.
After that grand start next I was shocked to see the water temperature had fallen to 51.8 degrees. That said I headed to my cold water spots, canals with dark muddy bottoms. The first 30 minutes were a bust as was the second stop.
Finally on stop number 3 the action started. Sheepshead finally started chewing but it was still slow action. The sheepshead were not tight to the pilings rather in the deeper channel. My 3 anglers did their part with quality casting and presentations. Captain Steven just stunk up the place Saturday.
I dropped off my anglers at lunch time and headed in leaving the Little Manatee scouting trip for another day. Captain Steven stopped on a 4’ grass flats adjacent to Indian key and promptly found the trout action. I was sick as my anglers would have loved this action. I quickly changed from live shrimp to tossing soft jerk baits on jig heads and things really heated up. I left the trout chewing and called it a day.
