New Smyrna Beach Area, Indian River Lagoon, Mosquito Lagoon Fishing Report

December 3, 2014

Hard to believe, but 2014 is almost over. As we enter December, November is wrapping up as one of the colder months I can remember. Passing cold fronts have dropped water temperatures into the 60’s and thinned out the summer baitfish numbers. In the Mosquito Lagoon, water has been crystal clear in most of the region and the redfish, black drum, and speckled trout have been active on the flats. In the New Smyna Beach and Ponce Inlet area, higher water levels is still keeping redfish and speckled trout scattered, but snook have schooled up in the winter time hangouts to hide from the cold. Sight fishing has been great to excellent with numerous chances. Catching numbers have varied widely depending on species we fish for or style we do it (live bait vs lures/fly). While the fishing is been really good, it’s only going to get better throughout the month as water levels drop and winter schools start to form on the flats and in the creeks and channels.

Have to lead with the Snook fishing because it’s definitely been the best thing going. Snook aren’t fond of cold water so with all the passing cold fronts bringing freeze conditions, snook quickly disappeared from the shallows and retreated to their winter hangouts. And they’ve been piled up! We’ve been fishing them hard over the past couple weeks and have been rewarded with double digit numbers landed each day (a couple days over 30 snook). Most of the fish are ranging 18-25 inches but we’ve been getting at least one each day lately around 10lbs (30”). We should be able to continue getting 15-20+ per day from now till early spring provided we don’t have any extreme cold weather events that brings on a fish kill. We’re catching all the snook on live shrimp, DOA shrimp, and Sebile and Mirrolure plugs.

Redfish action in the Mosquito Lagoon has been really good. Most of the Lagoon has crystal clear water. Higher water levels has the fish scattered over shallow grass flats and on sandy shorelines. Most of these fish range from 4-10lbs. Since the water levels are still high there isn’t much going on in terms of schooling. That will change over the next 4-6wks as water levels drop and condense fish on flat edges, sloughs and in creeks around New Smyrna Beach. Until then that happens though, this can been one of the best times of the year for sight fishing with numerous chances and shots. Catching averages can widely vary with days ranging from 5-25 redfish depending on conditions and how long we spend doing it.

This is a great time of the year to target a trophy size Speckled Trout approaching 10lbs or better. Big gator trout move up into the shallows during the next few months following baitfish and looking for warmer water. We’ve been seeing good numbers of trout in the 7-10lb range laid up in sand spots lately. All this clear water though makes big trout super spooky. Sight fishing them can be one of the most challenging things in inshore fishing. We do most of our successful catching using live bait with occasional catches on soft plastics. We typically aren’t spending much time the remainder of the year targeting smaller keeper size trout.

There’s been a bunch of Black Drum in a couple areas in the Mosquito Lagoon. Some of the schools have hundreds balled up. Catching can been really good on cut crabs and live shrimp. Most of them range from 3-10lbs with a few going close to 20lbs. As colder weather really settles in and water temps stay low consistently we’’ll see schools of giant black drum show up in a few places in the Lagoons. Some of these will be 40+lbs.

I’ve got 14 days left open in December. Word of caution though, the holidays are super busy every year and I’m always end up booked for two weeks straight so try not to wait till the last minute. I’ve got 10 days already filled for January, so it’s filling up quick too. Remember that I’ll take short notice trips if I have the date open.Call or email to secure a date. Read my fishing charter page to view the top reasons why you should book your trip with me today. I look forward to fishing with you soon…386-212-4931.