SW FL-Bonita Beach: Recent trips, before the rains came

<p>We have had a lot of rain recently and, prior to that, I was off the water for a couple of weeks, due to a family reunion. So there isn't a whole lot to report, but I did do a couple of trips inshore and near-shore. Last Monday morning, I headed to the near-shore reefs with Steve and Lori Greiner and their two young sons, Derek and Jared. Winds had picked up over the weekend, and it was beginning to get a little sloppy in the gulf, despite NOAA's forecast for two-foot seas. We used live shrimp to catch three Spanish mackerel to 23 inches and five keeper trout, three spotted sea-trout to 18 inches and a 16-inch silver trout. We released a smaller silver trout, some croakers, ladyfish, small sheepshead and mangrove snapper.

Tuesday brought high winds and a small-craft-caution. My offshore trip deferred to Friday, hoping for calmer seas by then.

My next trip was inshore, by necessity, on Thursday morning, when Steve Spritzer and Jalissa Reever gave up their offshore plans and fished with me in Estero Bay. Luckily, we beat the rain back to shore by a few minutes. The couple caught and released a 17-inch redfish and two stingray to 7 pounds. They also caught a 15-inch sheepshead and two 11-inch mangrove snapper, all on shrimp.

The photo shown is of angler, Patrick Dreyer, with an eleven-pound, 28-inch gag grouper caught on a bait-fish and released, due to closed season, on a recent offshore trip.

You can check out all of our shark and goliath grouper action videos at the following link:

http://www.fishbustercharters.com/fishing%20videos.htm