Big Mike in Fl

This

I didn’t know Florida strain was harder to catch... I never seemed to have a problem! That being said I’ve never fished for northern strain, so I have nothing else to compare it to. In all reality i don’t believe they’re harder to catch but rather they’re behaviors are different than northern strain, forage can be different, and the types of cover and structure are different. So someone who is used to fishing northern strain may struggle when trying to catch Florida strain for those reasons. But seriously, I’ve never had much of a problem...

Some years back I was fishing the Indian river lagoon system here (brackish water) when I happened to see two guys wade fishing I. A spot where my cousin and I used to wade fish as a kid, as I got closer low and behold it was my cousin, with a buddy of his. Well of course I invited them to climb aboard and we went off and fished, about an hour later an FWC officer cane tooling along and checked us all, both of them got tickets as they only had shore bound licenses. Fast forward to a couple weeks ago, same cousin who now lives out of state is in town visiting and we head out to fish, he of course made sure to get a license. So we’re at a ramp waiting in a thunderstorm to make up its mind where it’s going go, and a sheriffs wildlife deputy pulls up. We proceeded to BS with him for about ten minutes before he headed off to continue patrol. My cousin was ticked he didn’t check his license, I said you know he would have checked us if you didn’t buy one! Another time some years ago, I was out with my buddy on Garcia when we headed back to the ramp we could see the FWC officers doing spot checks at the ramp. At that very moment it occurred to me that my license might have expired. I convinced my buddy to cruise on by the ramp and head back out to the lake, sure enough I was expired. So I called the number on the back of the license and renewed it in the water. Got back to the ramp and got spot checked, officer asked me when I had renewed it and I told him that morning... trouble averted! I got in some one serious trouble with wildlife when I was younger, I try my best to behave myself these days. I enjoy the outdoors too much to risk it, and while the first time was a slap on the wrist, I know the second won’t be.

I gotta say, when the water temp is at 90* it can be awful hard putting together a successful day.

I believe at least second year in a row a Florida lake hasn’t made it in the top 10... seems used to be lake O, stick marsh, even the Kissimmee chain used to make it in the top 10s. Pretty sad.

I got a couple of their cyclone reels during a b1g1 deal, I spent $100. Wish I had just bought a single reel for the money, one completely broke apart, the other I still is but have had to mess with it a few times. Some people seemed to love them but I wasn’t impressed

Sitting on a dock in the Indian river lagoon, Bait fishing for whatever would bite as a young teen, a group of porpoise were chasing mullet, in skinny water around the docks that lined the shore. I saw a mullet jump, and the porpoise jump, catch the mullet, and jump clear over a dock! Won’t ever see that again. also had about a 2lb bass jump straight into the boat, wasn’t hooked or anything, just chasing bait and jumped right in. Coolest experience though was witnessing gators pool up some sort of fish, either shad, or gar. Hundreds of gators in an area of a football field, they would then come under the fish and hit them like bass hitting a top water. Something I’m pretty sure very few people have ever witnessed

I fished it once probably at least 10 years ago, the little lake is good for a morning trip around it. Caught some fish but nothing special. If I remember correctly some deeper she’ll beds in it. It certainly wasn’t exciting enough to continue to go, considering Garcia is right around the corner

I’ll look into Steele creek. Any suggestions since I’ll almost definitely be shore bound. And also best bets for baits this time of year?

Well, I bought the boat. Tried to upload the picture but it was too large. 1999 Stratos vindicator 283 with a Johnson fast strike 150. Original everything, motor only has 330 hrs and everything is in tip top shape. I’m pretty excited about it!

Awesome, thanks for the info

It does have the composite sticker on it, I know the hull is composite, but I know a lot of boats in the late 90s still had wood decks. I think I saw searching through other forums that they did go to all composite in 99. Just hoping maybe Someone can confirm?

I’ve actually been contemplating dropping the FC leader on my spinnerbait and swim jig set ups because of this. I guess that’s one answer. I do know that in some applications I’ve seen noticeable increase in strikes when using FC vs not. But in the case of moving baits in moderate to heavy cover I agree it may not be as necessary

Hey guys I’m looking at picking up one of these tomorrow, and was wondering if anyone could give me some info, is the boat completely composite, or is the deck wood? The current owner said it’s full composite, but I haven’t been able to verify that online.