Yesterday I had my buddy Mike aboard the Professional and showed him some new places in the Everglades National Park. We found clean, clear water to the East and the trout bite was awesome early in the morning. Mike caught his first trout on a top water lure (lot of floating grass, so best to use single hooks and retrieve with the wind/current). We probably caught 20 trout before we decided to go look for reds and snook. High tide was at about 5:30 a.m. so we knew we would have falling water for several hours. Fishing soft plastics (mostly natural colored Z-Man jerk shads and Diezel Minnoz on keel weighted rigging hooks), we caught several snook and rat sized reds. I was poling Mike on a shallow water flat behind a key when we spotted two big snook laid up in the grass. Mike made one cast--not so good--and then another--missed again. The third cast was on the mark and the big girl ate! After a nice fight, Mike landed this 33" robalo--his biggest ever. Life is good--I am truly a blessed man.
