Adam and I decided to go fishing one more time before winter break was up. The weather was nice and sunny when he picked me up with my rods to head over to a bait shop near East Greynolds Park to go fishing. The bait shop was found on google maps, and it was supposedly open over 24 hours. It and its clientele seemed pretty sketchy, and when I walked in I was packed into a small space with a wall of hooks and gear in front of me. Regardless, though, they gave me a proper amount of huge live shrimp. Satisfied, we drove over to the park, which I hadn't fished in years. When we got there, the normal pier looked a little off so I told Chopp to wait in the car while I went to check it out. Unfortunately, it was closed down due to disrepair. It seems like every good public dock in Miami is getting closed for disrepair without any plan to repair them nowadays. Anyways, I was about to go back when a friendly stranger named Michael called out to me and came over. He showed us the different spots in between the mangroves on the bank where we could fish. They seemed to me to be like kayak in/outputs, but they did indeed work for fishing. Michael was fishing a lure and when we were talking about the nearby dam, he said that he only came for one fish: the Snook. Snook often hang around places with fast moving water, dams included, where nutrients and bait fish come through as they pick them off. Michael said that he comes every time it rains, as the canal that flows into the saltwater where we were overflows during and after rain periods, and the dam comes up. The rushing water when the dam comes up is sure to produce big Snook. This was really useful information about a fish that I had long wanted to catch and still have not.
Michael reccomended going with a popping cork for the shrimp, which I did have from St. Augustine. I tied one up, and Chopp and I were fishing at our different spots, with some guidance and company from Mike. Eventually, as Mike and Chopp were elsewhere, my cork went down. I set the hook and easily reeled in an Oyster Toadfish. I hadn't caught one of them in a while, and while it wasn't necessarily what I'd have been hoping for, it was a cool fish to catch again and to get us on the board. I kept on casting from the shore out to a nearby mangrove island and slowly retrieving it, waiting for fish to take it. Soon enough, a Mangrove Snapper took it and I reeled it in. That was two fish on the day. It wasn't long after that I, employing the same method, caught a Crevalle Jack. Known as being hard fighters pound-for-pound, it did not disappoint. Although it is considered by many to be a trash fish, I've always enjoyed the fights they put up and their interesting coloration and design.
Chopp and I kept on fishing, with me handing the rod off to Chopp to fish with the popping cork. The tide was rising throughout our fishing time; we noticed that the best time for fishing was when the water was passing through during the strongest parts of the rising tide, in between low and high. As we fished, Chopp seemed to stop getting bites. However, when he handed the rod off to me to use the restroom, I immediately started getting hits again and caught an 11 inch Mangrove Snapper. This kind of surprised me because the spot is generally overfished, although without the dock being open I guess it may not be. Regardless, it was a great catch to surprise Chopp with when he came back. All in all we caught 5 fish. We switched off with the rod with the popping cork setup, which seemed to be the only one that worked (the other rod was also of a noticeably worse quality), but I was the one who was lucky enough to catch them. I'm not sure how much of it is due to experience and skill I've built as a fisherman or just luck. Probably some of both. Regardless, the information we gained from Michael about the spot too was very helpful, and his help today and with advice from the future was pretty cool. I want to come back and try on a rainy day. It was a fun morning and afternoon to spend on the water, which, especially given the weather and the shade provided from the mangrove trees, was idyllic. Fishing in Miami doesn't really get old.
