Outdoors

Daily fishing report

By DOUG HEMMER
Published September 7, 2005

Hurricane Katrina has dealt inshore fishing another blow. Katrina's strong westerly winds pushed large concentrations of Red Tide off the beach and back into the shallow waters east of the beach. The residential canals inside John's Pass were littered with thousands of dead mullet. The east beach area of Fort DeSoto had over 200 dead redfish wash up on the beach. There were over 50 redfish and a few turtles lining the mangroves of Tarpon Key. Reports from the Sarasota area were even worse. Most of the areas affected had thousands of birds feeding on the dying bait. The strong smell and cough associated with Red Tide has diminished, but the damage has been done.

The future effects in these areas are hard to predict. When the Red Tide bloom entered these areas, most of the ladyfish and trout were wiped out. The snook took a hard hit, but still could be found schooled up in some areas. The redfish would leave during the outbreak and return when the bloom wasn't strong. The high death toll during the last outbreak hopefully won't hurt future stocks. The good news is most of the snook and redfish will move to the unaffected north part of Tampa Bay in October.

Some of the best areas to target that are not affected presently are most of the east side of Tampa Bay from Rattlesnake Key north to the upper parts of the bay and back down the west side to the Pier in St. Petersburg. There are still good reports of snook, redfish and trout north of the Dunedin Causeway.

Doug Hemmer charters out of St. Petersburg. Call (727) 347-1389.

[Last modified September 7, 2005, 01:02:19]