My boy's first redfish!

[Dave B.]

Thought I'd share, we're down here in Fla again on vacation and for the holidays.
We're on day 2 out of 19 right now and the boy from the start pester'd me to take him fishin. We didnt tow the boat, so I had to hunt/scout my old jaunts down here and come to find out.. still available (not developed yet..) and accessable!! so that was a sweet suprise. Since we didnt tow the boat down, my sis offered up their boat for us to use while they're at work, and today we took it out to fish the flats up by Blackburn point.

Well had a slow day for us adults, but the boy had always seen on tv the FLW redfish deals, the redfish in magazines and in fishin books and stuff.. so on the trip down, dadda promised him a chance at a redfish or two and speckled trout, or in some cases gator trout as they're called down here. I didnt promise tarpon on this trip, only the reds and trout. So we went up the ICW to an old flats spot (old unmarked channel that's been around since I was a kid on the back of some flats) and started flingin the live shrimp on our light gear.

Next thing ya know... my boy is hollerin from the front that he's got one.. I'm thinkin it could be a trout, then he gets it close to the boat and then there's ol bronze side tuggin (water was very clear today). Once we told him what he had, he went ballistic! ha ha ha ha.... his first redfish. (see picture)

Anyway, he ended boating 2 reds, his uncle Steve got a red, his aunt Connie got a sheepshead and a ladyfish. Fishin with 6 lb test, we had about 4-5 break off's.. So for fishin two dozen shrimps it wasnt a bad day at all... we all had fun for the young man and took LOT's of pictures..

By the way, the weather was beautiful today, very warm in the 70's and the gulf was as flat as a pancake today!! (made me wish we'd of towed the boat down!!)
Of course all fish released and swam off to fight another day!
Now to go get him his first grouper!

here's some pix: