Help me build my tacklebox

[HarborRat]

Originally Posted by MartyGras

Thanks everyone for the great replies and Especially MA I look forward to taking you up on your offer.

Perhaps I should've rephrased my request, I should've written help me build my Florida tacklebox.

Most of my experience is fishing in northeastern salt and freshwater and while many will say fishing is fishing it's simply not true.

For instance I don't think you'll find one DOA popping cork in the entire northeastern United States.

I've got plenty of rods reels FireWire floro carbon nets etc. what I don't know is which lures and rigs work the best down here.

Why does it seem like nobody goes flounder fishing, it's my understanding that Charlotte Harbor is full of flounder. Perhaps it's not sexy enough

Gary

My Florida tackle box isn't much different from my NE box.

A regular old silver/black Rapala is still my go-to topwater, sometimes an all black Bomber. Bucktails work as well down here has they do up there, but not many use them. I don't think I own anything made by DOA, and the only Storms I have are soft swim baits that work great but get destroyed quickly by these toothy critters. Those "walk the dog" type topwaters that are all the rage down here now aren't much or any different than the good old Zara Spook we used up there for decades. I didn't like them then and I still don't now. The only "different" lures I use here are the heavy metal Gotcha type lures for when schools of macks, jacks or trout are around...but they aren't much different than using diamond j1gs for bluefish.

Leaders and hooks need to be stronger down here. Everything has teeth and muscle. I tried for an entire day drifting the harbor for fluke (really flounder down here) with a regular old fluke rig with stripped squid on a couple rods and a bucktail on another. Using 40lb flouro leaders I lost a lot of rigs to sharks, and caught a lot of sharks, catfish, small cobia and a few other species but NO fluke. I think that is why it is hard to target them....they are more of a lucky by-catch. To target them up north I used ~12lb flouro leaders because fluke have good eyesight...you'd lose too many fish with that here.

Also I'm not a huge fan of the fluke's flaky meat. I'd much rather eat one of the meaty fish we have plenty of here, and many others probably feel the same. Up in the NE I preferred striper, seabass and even blues to the fluke, and down here I'd rather eat a cobia, snook, redfish, sheepshead etc.

So....I say you can use whatever you had confidence with using up north. Techniques for snook, reds and other shallow water fish here are more similar to NE freshwater bass fishing than NE saltwater fishing. Remember that and you'll do better on them. And the deeper water fishing here is about the same as up there, and the same lures and tackle will catch as many fish as any "new trend" that people use here. Fishfinder rigs, top and bottoms, and bucktails all work...just need a heavier leader.

[Seafood Junky]

3.5" Zara Spook in Bone color.
Rapala XR 8 and 10 in white (or other colors).
3-6" Bass assassins with paddle tails
Zara Spook
DOA Baitbuster (light color)
DOA Shrimp (various colors and sizes)
light, med, heavy j heads
Pompano Js
Silly-Banana (the other pomp Jhead)
zara spook
circle hooks and different pound tests of fluorocarbon leader material
good long nose SS pliers
Split ring pliers
zara spook
fish lip grabber
good scissors

Replace the treble hooks with these:



These work good for keen eyed snappers with live shrimp!:

Screw into the tail, and hook unerneath.
These work good too and cheaper:

Just get small ones...

Mike G

[Messing About]

(Throws a flag), yelling, "Illegal procedure".
If we"re going to have a general Charlotte Harbor Fishing discussion, let's take it upstairs, boys....take it upstairs!"

Took too long to get that sticky thread....gotta support the cause.

Seriously though, Gary, let's plan a Saturday in June. My crystal ball tells me Saturday the 13th looks like a good bite between 8 and Noon. For info on Foounder, head to the fishing thread.

[MartyGras]

Originally Posted by Messing About

(Throws a flag), yelling, "Illegal procedure".
If we"re going to have a general Charlotte Harbor Fishing discussion, let's take it upstairs, boys....take it upstairs!"

Took too long to get that sticky thread....gotta support the cause.

Seriously though, Gary, let's plan a Saturday in June. My crystal ball tells me Saturday the 13th looks like a good bite between 8 and Noon. For info on Foounder, head to the fishing thread.

MA I'm going to take you up on that offer however I'll be heading north next week and not sure when I'll be back down (I have to go home).

I'll give you a heads up when I'm coming back down and we'll plan a trip.

Gary

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