Back at it

Redfish Series action resumes after weather delay

FERNANDINA BEACH, Fla. – They spent the previous day watching TV in hotel rooms, tending to boat maintenance and fiddling with tackle, but now FLW Redfish Series anglers are back on the water for the delayed second round of competition in Fernandina Beach.

Teams launched into pleasant conditions with clear skies and lighter breezes that sharply contrasted Friday’s gloomy weather when Tropical Storm Hanna passed offshore, rustled Northeast Florida with strong, gusty winds and postponed the tournament’s second day. The storm did no damage locally and although winds of 25 mph stirred the shallows, area waters were already murky from heavy freshwater runoff, compliments of Hurricane Fay two weeks earlier.

Tide will be the most significant factor and for many and the day’s schedule will prove challenging. Northeast Florida’s large tidal fluctuations require astute observation and planning, as fish positioning, boat access and navigational safety varies considerably throughout the day.

In the proverbial nutshell, low tide pulls redfish into channels and deep cuts where they await the incoming cycle. During low water, baitfish and shrimp also congregate along these edges. Redfish follow the chow, so finding the food sources usually means finding redfish.

Of course, too much of a good thing can be a bad thing, as Joe Wortham of Cocoa, Fla. found out. He and his partner Joe Hebert of Dunedin, Fla. found loads of redfish on day one, but the reds had gorged on abundant shrimp and minnows and were snubbing their lures. Today, they’ll use 2-inch green, gold and green/white SS Minnows to imitate the real stuff.

“We saw hundreds of fish, but only got two strikes all day,” Wortham said. “There were too many shrimp and too many small baits. These fish are packed. You just have to use something small and hope and pray that they bite.”

Area redfish do their best feeding when high water grants them access to the sprawling pastures of spartina grass stretching throughout the Intracoastal Waterway and local estuaries. The muddy bottom in which spartina anchors holds a briny buffet of fiddler crabs, snails and other wiggly, crawly critters that reds love to eat.

When redfish tip downward to root out this forage, their tails break the surface and wave side-to-side for balance. “Tailing,” as it’s known, offers clear casting references. Once the fish submerge, murky water conceals them, but their lumbering ways provide secondary clues by wiggling the grass and pushing the shallow water.

Anglers will work low-water spots such as channel edges and deep holes and then move toward the grass as the tide starts rising. The tough part will be the narrow window of high water access. High tide in the Fernandina area is 2:18 p.m. today, so anglers will spend most of their day working low water spots with topwaters, spinnerbaits and jigs.

When the tide rises, gold spoons and soft plastic jerkbaits are good choices for probing the edges of grass lines, while throwing an in-line spinnerbait into the grass and ripping it out will also tempt redfish. During the flood tide, lighter presentations with smaller soft plastic baits Texas-rigged on weighted worm hooks will work best.

Day one leaders Roger Crafton of Boca Grande, Fla. and John Ochs of Englewood, Fla. will be looking to build on their opening weight of 11 pounds, 12 ounces. The top anglers caught their first weight fish around 8 a.m. on low tide against a grass line and added a second while casting around creeks within the flooded marsh.

“We’re going to do the same thing we did (on day one),” Crafton said. “We’ll start on our low-tide spot and fish there until we think it’s futile. We eliminated a lot of spots (on day one), so we’ll go to our high tide spot and if the fish aren’t tailing or if the tide isn’t high enough, we’ll fish the ditches leading into those areas and hopefully pick up a fish or two.”

Chris Joseph of Holmes Beach, Fla. and John Jernigan of Venice, Fla. sit just four ounces off the lead with 11-8. Fifth place is 9 pounds, 11 ounces, but tenth is just two pounds less, so there’s plenty of room for the standings to change.

Logistics

All teams compete during the first two days, and the top five teams based on accumulated weight advance to day three. Final standings are determined by the total weight from all three days.

Sunday teams will take off at 7 a.m. from Fernandina Harbor Marina, located at 1 Front Street in Fernandina Beach. Saturday’s weigh-ins will be held at the Marina beginning at 3 p.m. Sunday’s final weigh-ins start at 4 p.m. at the Wal-Mart store located at 1757 South 14th Street in Fernandina Beach. Take-offs and weigh-ins are free, and the community is invited to attend the festivities.

The Fernandina Beach FLW Redfish Series event is hosted by the Amelia Island, Fernandina Beach, Yulee Chamber of Commerce. The top award of $50,000 includes $20,000 cash plus a $15,000 cash bonus from Ranger Boats and a $15,000 cash bonus from Yamaha or Evinrude if contingency guidelines are met.

The top 50 teams in each division of the 2008 FLW Redfish Series, based on Land O’Lakes Team of the Year points standings at the end of the season, will advance to the $300,000 Wal-Mart FLW Redfish Series Championship Oct. 30-Nov. 1 in Biloxi, Miss. The winning team at the championship will earn as much as $100,000.

Saturday’s conditions:

Sunrise: 7:07 a.m.

Temperature at takeoff: 77

Expected high temperature: 90

Water temperature: 78

Wind: West 8-10 mph

Humidity: 52 percent

Day’s outlook: Sunny