One must love March or at least I do. The cold winter gloomy weather is passing and the promise of new life signs are showing. The crazy deep freeze we had this winter ended the best trout fishing spree we have seen in probably ten years. Limits of large speckled trout were being caught easily and many anglers finished their trips with the legal limit.
Our Department of Natural Resources is asking anglers to release any trout they may catch through September in an effort to help the survivors rebuild the stocks we enjoyed so immensely this fall. But so much for the bad news, lets get back to the promise of spring.
My favorite fish to catch, bluewater species aside, the master bait thief, the cunning and most clever of the inshore fishing species, sheepshead are biting. To coin a worn out phrase the best method of hooking one of these tasty battlers is to “hook him before he bites”. Sporting a set of molars that crush mussels and barnacles with ease makes taking a tasty fiddler crab off your hook a simple endeavor.
Fiddlers seem irresistible to these stocky black and white stripe bruisers so they are the preferred bait. Methods can be fishing alongside bridges or pilings, with a short leader and an egg sinker above the rig, just enough weight to hold in the current. I use this same rig on the offshore reefs where if anchored above the structure you just drop to the bottom and raise the sinker off the bottom just enough, keeping tension on the line along with a keen eye on your rod tip for the telltale tap of a bite.
Once you have seen it chances are you have been taken. Re-bait and repeat … with a couple of hundred fiddlers and some practice you will enjoy a great battle and some of the best eating fish you ever will wrap your lips around! See ya out there.