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Targeting Snook In The Southwest Region With Capt. Ron Hueston

 | By Seamus on 4/15/2014 1:20:37 PM | Views (56)

April is one of the best months of the year to fish for snook in the Everglades backcounty. I’ll usually concentrate my efforts from Hurdles Creek to Lostman’s River, but will also move around the Naples area quite a bit.

In the spring, we get extreme low tides on the new and full moons, and those tides really pull a lot of water out of the backcountry. Along with all that flowing water will be shrimp, crabs and baitfish that are being hustled along by the tides, and the snook will be in those moving water areas to take advantage of the abundance of food.

If you’ve never fished the Everglades backcountry, then you don’t realize that every inch of shoreline, every mangrove or oyster bar or small island looks like it will hold fish. That’s not the case. There are specific scenarios that tend to hold the majority of feeding gamefish, and one of the most productive is to fish the points of land with good moving water.

If you think about it, every bait that is moving along with the tide has to go around that point. If you have a straight shoreline, the fish and bait can be anywhere, but when you have a point that sticks out and speeds up the current, everything has to go around it whether they want to or not, so that’s where the fish like to wait in ambush. Cut-throughs in the islands are another similar scenario that’s very productive, as are the windy points on the super windy days, because the wind pushes the current faster around the points, and the big snook really like that.

One of the best ways to gauge the current speed and where it’s flowing strongest along a shoreline is to look closely at the leaves and seagrass flowing along with the tide. Like a shrimp or small baitfish that can’t fight the current, the leaves will gather in one area, and that’s the same area the bait will hold. If the bait is there, the fish will be there, particularly if there’s a little feeder creek, point or downed timber around for the snook to use as an ambush point.

Most of the time I’m fishing snook in April, I’m fishing lures like five inch soft plastic swimbaits in solid colors like white, pink, gold, chartreuse or brown—I like to fish the solid colors in the tannic stained water. Small chugging lures in solid colors also work well, particularly those that have a feather on the back treble hook, which gives the fish an idea of where the front and rear of the bait are, so it knows which way it’s going to move.

I fish a lot of very small lipped baits, like 2 to 4 inches in length, along with the smaller topwater plugs this time of the year. Those lures work really well when cast parallel down the shoreline and worked tight to the shore or trees. The fish will dart out from the trees to grab the baits.

If the weather is really nice, the outer beaches from Highland Beach all the way to Ft. Myers can be super for snook on the higher stages of the tides. That’s more of a live bait give, using live pilchards or sardines. The snook will run the shoreline trough along the beach, looking for small baitfish pushed up with the waves. If you’re fishing from shore, you want to take two steps into the water, turn to your side and cast parallel to the shore.

For tackle, I like 4,000 size spinning reels and 20 to 30 pound braided line if fishing in the backcountry. You can go lighter along the beaches if there’s no structure for the fish to break you off on. A big snook will zip out 50 yards of line in no time, so you need to be able to stop the fish or at least slow it down if it heads for structure, or you’ll lose it. Match the reel up with a 7 foot fast-tapered, medium-action rod and 40 pound test fluorocarbon leader.

The best case scenario in the Everglades backcountry is to fish midday, with a good falling tide when the fish are going to be active. On the beaches, it seems like a dawn or dusk high, incoming tide is the most productive. 

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Catch Information

Species:
Scaled Sardine
Scaled Sardine

Snook
Snook

This Fishing Report was submitted on 4/15/2014 1:20:37 PM by Seamus and last updated on 4/15/2014 1:20:37 PM.


Location

83268 Overseas Highway
Islamorada, FL US


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