Flagler Beach Reds
By Keith Lozott, Contributing Writer
My second trip to the Flagler Beach/Palm Coast area is deposited in the memory bank and ready for withdraw when needed. After fishing with Captain Jim Britton of Salty Tales Fishing Charters last year and having a great time, it was a no brainer to fish with him again. This trip my buddy Eric the Red joined me to fish this area that looks nothing like our home waters. Flagler/Palm Coast is in the sub-tropical climate zone of Florida and has oyster beds, creeks, small mangroves and a unique coastal feel with large oak hammocks and pine trees. The Intracoastal Waterway is very narrow in this section and the fishing pressure is way less than we see in South Florida.
This was a fast and furious fishing trip for us! We drove up the night before so we could get some sleep before the early start the next morning. The drive for us is about three hours so getting up at 4 a.m. wasn’t ideal since we were driving home after fishing. Splitting a room was worth the $38 each for a good night sleep, not to mention we could have a few drinks and dinner the night before.
As for the fishing this time around, it surely didn’t disappoint!!! Captain Jim Britton knows some spots that have produced for me every time I’ve fished with him. We went south towards Flagler Beach and fished oyster bars on a beautiful flat. Capt. Jim poled us (and what seemed to be right away) to a group of redfish that were crushing small mullet in slick calm shallow water surrounded by oyster bars and mangroves. The fish were producing wakes that revealed their location and direction of travel. Our job was to make accurate casts and present our artificial baits so that the fish couldn’t refuse the offer. Our first hook up was a double on two carbon copy fish out of a school of hungry reds. Once hooked up, we had a quick fist bump knowing how awesome it was to get a double hookup right away. We landed the fish, took a couple of pics and released them to fight another day. We poled up the flat in search of more fish when what we thought was a nice redfish pushing off came into casting range. I had tossed a Yo-Zuri suspending twitch bait in its direction and held on. The fish crushed the bait and low and behold it was a nice trout. I love catching and releasing big trout, which is why I don’t have a pic of her. It’s important to get fish back in the water as quickly as possible, unharmed to lessen the mortality rate. We continued and landed a couple more reds before the morning’s end and the wind kicked up pushing us off the flat.
All I can say is get up to Palm Coast, call Captain Jim Britton, and have a blast on the water!
Keith Lozott The Fishing Realtor