Anna Maria Island Fishing Report-April-22-2013
Captain Rick Gross
Fishy Business Fishing Charters
SarasotaFishingWithRick.com
Island Discount Tackle Charter Desk: (941) 779-2838
www.KeyesMarina.com
—–“It was a great week” is the fishing report from Island Discount Tackle on Anna Maria Island. Everything that bites in our area is on the prowl.
—–Saturday the wind laid down so we headed offshore to check on the kingfish bite. We found bait and birds around six miles out on some hard bottom. After putting a chum bag out and a few handfuls of shiners things started happening. I did not have a chance to get all the lines out when the first rod was bent and the drag screaming with a nice fish. We caught schoolie kingfish in the thirty inch range all day with black tip sharks from four feet to six feet which kept everyone on their toes. At one point we had a shark, a kingfish and a bonito on at the same time.
—–Tuesday we stayed inshore for a half day and caught and released eighteen snook up to thirty two inches in north Sarasota bay.
—–Thursday I had two half day trips. There were kids onboard in the morning. Anytime I have kids on the boat, the main thing is to just bend a rod. We headed to some deep water grass flats off the bulkhead for some mackerel and trout action. The first fish was a nice flounder then a sea bass then a bluefish then a mackerel it was great. We ended up with ten different kinds of fish in one spot. The top fish of the day was a twenty five inch gag grouper that we photographed and released.
—–On the afternoon trip, we wanted to do some catch and release snook fishing and we managed to land around twelve snook, up to thirty inches long. We also had a few gator-sized trout mixed in.
—–Friday was a full day inshore trip. We did well on redfish in the slot from twenty three inches to twenty seven inches. We also released a bunch of snook from twenty inches up to twenty nine inches and ended up the day with four keeper-sized reds and a dozen trout for dinner. CLICK ON THE THUMBNAILS BELOW FOR MORE PHOTOS!