Had
some fun fishing for what I would call smallies x 10 = Peacock bass and Snook.
Lost a lot more than we landed but definitely a great way to mix it up
after some rough times out on the lake. Didn't experiment too much with
baits relying on a classic Rebel Pop-R - something with some silver or a green
back seemed to be the best bet - and a Rapala X-Rap 6 and 8 (same color rules
apply).
I
haven’t had much boat experience fishing for Peacocks while living in Florida –
this making really the second time we’ve really put the hammer down and gotten
species focused for them - and I was amazed how much the summer patterns we
picked up were analogous to smallmouth behavior this time of year. Bites in the canals were all related to
current and transitionary cover (a chunk rock bank to sand for example). The canal fish were definitely more moody as
well, clicking on and off throughout the day and completely shutting down in
areas with large water clarity changes.
On the main lake it was like being back up north – every better bite had
something to do with offshore structure.
We located a couple rock piles as well as a sunken boat in 7-8’ of water
and the rainbow sided bulldogs were there - often times in groups of 2 or
3. Crazy how smallie-like they behave!
Awesome
couple of days took some tweaking to accommodate the masses of 1”-1 1/2” bait
swimming around but once we got our presentations ironed out it was on. We approached everything with 7’ M and MH
spinning tackle spooled up with 15-20lbs braid (no leaders) – biggest mod we
made (something we should have figured out way earlier) came on the final
day when we bumped up to heavy gauge #4
trebles. Landing percentages went way up
and we didn’t have to baby the fish as much – just let the drag and the rod tip
do the work. Got a bunch of video – most
of it heartbreaking but cool all the same!
