Weather putting fish off their game

*Weather putting fish off their game*

*JIM SUTTON*

**The St. Johns River and area lakes:** The shrimp are still hanging around, but most are way north, apparently waiting to exit the Mayport Inlet when that secret urge moves them. A couple of bass anglers said they caught about 200 in a dozen casts and that they ranged from tiny to impressive.

The speckled perch fishing is picking up, even though water temperatures are, again, on the rise. Those in the vegetation last week have moved to deeper water and structure.

The bluegill and catfish bites remain really strong. The catfish are generally frying size and the bluegills are filleting-size  good eating no matter how you slice them.

Bass fishing isnt bad. Mike Cenci and Ben Williams, who sent me a couple of bass pictures, also sent me a photo of a channel cat that looked to be around nine pounds, a half-hour after the bass pictures.

**The Intracoastal Waterway:** Speckled seatrout were a tale of two fish this week. If you fished south, there were very few. To the north, especially up around the airport, there were some limits of legal trout, along with tons of small ones.

The redfish bite is crazy right now, but youd be lucky to ice one keeper out of a dozen fish. Theyre small. Didnt hear all the pompano reports in the river like last week. And it a little surprising that bluefish didnt come up more often.

The biggest fish caught were sheepshead and black drum. Avid Angler reported weighing a trio of sheepshead of 6, 6.5 and 7 pounds earlier in the week. Most of the drum are 5-plus pounds. That about it.

**The Atlantic:** It been snotty all week out there, so the few offshore reports are a little too old to be of much use. But the sailfish bite out inside the ledge seemed to be as good as anything, with blackfin tuna right behind. A few dolphin and wahoo were caught as well: nothing in impressive numbers.

Didnt hear anything from the local reefs and wrecks other than a lot of barracuda and a cobia or two. But, again, it been awful choppy out there.

Surf fishing continues to pick up. Seems most of the pompano concentrations have moved south from the north beaches to Crescent Beach, Marineland and the Hammock. The whiting, when you find them, are chubby. And most of the surf stringers were stretched by a redfish and black drum or two.

**The weather:** The weatherman says to look for northeast winds at 10 to 15 knots Saturday and southeast winds at 10 to 15 knots Sunday, Seas both days are 2 to 4 feet inside 20 miles; bumpier farther out.

P.S. If anyone looking for a 6hp 4-stroke, give me a call. Jim Sutton provides a weekly fishing report for The Record. Contact him at jim. sutton@staugustine.com

**Contributed Photo:**

If youre a freshwater angler, you may recognize this abstract photo. Hint: It a maw. Mike Cenci and Ben Williams caught this fish Wednesday up around Julington Creek in the St. Johns River. There is a regular picture too, but this one lends a great perspective as to why theyre called largemouth bass. The fish actually hit a live shrimp and threw up the big mullet while they were unhooking her for release. They estimated her weight at 7.5 pounds.