Post by Steve Sutton on May 9, 2010 12:31:47 GMT -5
The spotted sea trout 2010 fishing season has started. However, it’s not as good as it gets at least not yet! A few trout are being caught mixed in with the red fish, flounder, and black drum.
Where are the Speckled Sea Trout?
By Capt. Rick Reynolds of Miss Judy Charters
With the Blistering Cold winter of 2009 behind us, it left the “experts” and biologist wondering what the impact of the 9 or so well below freezing days has done to the trout fishery. In North Carolina, I read of a huge fish kill of all inshore species, not just speckled sea trout.
From what I have read about the speckled Sea trout, they cannot tolerate water temps below 44 degrees. In December, before the hard freeze that left ice in our marshes, I had a charter that caught a few huge trout and the water temp was hovering around 48 degrees. Soon after that we had several cold fronts push into our area and it quickly brought the water temps down to the very low 40’s. I know we had 9 days in a row where the air temp did not climb above 32.
I read a report and heard by word of mouth that someone counted around 500 dead trout in south channel. That is not a huge number when you consider how many fish are taken from our waters daily. But it was a fish kill nonetheless. The conservationist along with other organizations quickly moved to make a suggestion of releasing all trout over 18 inches. I like to practice catch and release, but maybe they have jumped the gun on this, like with the snapper and grouper closures.
Any way I have my own “barometer” of when I start really looking for speckled Sea trout.
The arrival of jellyfish in the sound. This has occurred.
The arrival of bonnet head sharks. Capt. Alan Collins caught one 2 weeks ago
The change in predominate winds from north to south. This has occurred.
The arrival of monarch butterflies. Not yet seen them.
So 3 out of 4 of the indicators that Sea Trout should be here have happened and we got our first trout on Saturday, but we were not targeting them.
So, if I am correct the fish kill was not as bad as predicted and the cold removed the weaker fish from the gene pool and pushed back the timetable of when to expect Sea trout in numbers.
I would expect the speckled Sea trout bite to be really heating up no later than May 15th 2010. If not, then perhaps the “experts” were correct and we did suffer a Major fish kill. One theory is that the Trout were stunned and the Dolphins swooped in and devoured most of them. This may or may not have happened. Let’s hope not.
Where are the Speckled Sea Trout?
By Capt. Rick Reynolds of Miss Judy Charters
With the Blistering Cold winter of 2009 behind us, it left the “experts” and biologist wondering what the impact of the 9 or so well below freezing days has done to the trout fishery. In North Carolina, I read of a huge fish kill of all inshore species, not just speckled sea trout.
From what I have read about the speckled Sea trout, they cannot tolerate water temps below 44 degrees. In December, before the hard freeze that left ice in our marshes, I had a charter that caught a few huge trout and the water temp was hovering around 48 degrees. Soon after that we had several cold fronts push into our area and it quickly brought the water temps down to the very low 40’s. I know we had 9 days in a row where the air temp did not climb above 32.
I read a report and heard by word of mouth that someone counted around 500 dead trout in south channel. That is not a huge number when you consider how many fish are taken from our waters daily. But it was a fish kill nonetheless. The conservationist along with other organizations quickly moved to make a suggestion of releasing all trout over 18 inches. I like to practice catch and release, but maybe they have jumped the gun on this, like with the snapper and grouper closures.
Any way I have my own “barometer” of when I start really looking for speckled Sea trout.
The arrival of jellyfish in the sound. This has occurred.
The arrival of bonnet head sharks. Capt. Alan Collins caught one 2 weeks ago
The change in predominate winds from north to south. This has occurred.
The arrival of monarch butterflies. Not yet seen them.
So 3 out of 4 of the indicators that Sea Trout should be here have happened and we got our first trout on Saturday, but we were not targeting them.
So, if I am correct the fish kill was not as bad as predicted and the cold removed the weaker fish from the gene pool and pushed back the timetable of when to expect Sea trout in numbers.
I would expect the speckled Sea trout bite to be really heating up no later than May 15th 2010. If not, then perhaps the “experts” were correct and we did suffer a Major fish kill. One theory is that the Trout were stunned and the Dolphins swooped in and devoured most of them. This may or may not have happened. Let’s hope not.
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