Nature Coast, Capt William Toney 10/5/2016

With two weeks of fishing with good friend and client for over ten years Dave P. and I have caught about every fish known to pass through the Homosassa waters. The trout and redfish bite is the best as it should be this time of year. For the Nature coast this is our bread and butter for a inshore guide. The trout bite has been the best on moving water especially on the first part of the incoming tide. Use a cupped popping cork with a dark colored soft plastic and red jig head to get the bite. Look for bottom that has rock grass like that around North West Key, west of St. Martins Key and Mangrove Point.

The redfish bite is best on the incoming tide, north of the Homosassa River use live shrimp and south I’ve had better luck using a dark colored artificial soft plastic on a 1/8 oz. red jig head. We have caught some nice snook this week with the same lure but targeting points with fast flowing water. The near shore rocks are very productive with keeper grouper on shallow running plugs, flounder, mangrove snapper and  grunts on live shrimp with a jig head. A surprise came this weekend on a sand hole with a small rock in the middle. Permit were schooling on top of it and we caught and landed 14 in two days. Free lined live shrimp was the best bait and you never know what you run across this time of year. This weekend the incoming tide will be at daylight in the morning. W