By Jimmy Tomazinis
mail@floridanewsline.com
Ah, such comfortable weather we have in the month of July. High humidity and daytime temperatures rarely dip below 90. A glorious time to venture outside. I’m hoping you could sense the sarcasm as I write this, but with all the heat and humidity comes hot fishing.
I recall writing similar things just last year about the struggle to find comfortable times and places to fish this time of year. Comfort for us might also be better fishing as well. Early and late, deep water, and shade all being positive things to improve the chances of catching fish and the length of time you can pursue them.
Shrimp have trickled into the river and this month we should be happy to have fewer throws of the cast net to make for a day’s fishing. Fishing them under docks and area bridges can catch just about everything in the river right now — stripers, redfish, flounder, and sheepshead just to name a few. Presenting them with jig heads, floats, and free lined will all work, but few methods catch everything like the jig head. You can experiment with different colors but chartreuse always has a place in my jig head collection. I use either a ⅛ oz. or ¼ oz. depending on the size of the shrimp, depth of the water, and speed of the current. I want the shrimp to reach the bottom, but I don’t want it to sink too fast since a lot of fish like to hit it as it falls. I also don’t spend a ton of money on them since you’re bound to lose some jig heads to fish around structure. If you rig the shrimp on the hook just right, you’ll rarely get snagged except on crab traps. Pass the hook through the shrimp from top to bottom near the tail and then twist the hook around and bury it into the bottom of the shrimp near its head or mid section. Don’t let the hook point poke through the top of the shrimp since that’s what makes it almost snag proof. I hope the short description helps, but if not send me an email and I’ll send you a picture or diagram to explain it better. Give it a try this month and be sure to stay hydrated out there. Tight lines.
