January 13, 2006 - Central Florida Fishing Guide Capt. Chris Myers - Mosquito Lagoon Fishing Report This week was a perfect reminder of the joy of living in Florida as pleasant temperatures were combined with outstanding fishing. I took three trips to the Mosquito Lagoon this week and the sight fishing was as good as it gets. Monday, I fished with Mike Pollack. With water Temperatures in the 50’s from last week’s cold weather, we decided to begin the day looking for some big trout in shallow water. We found some right away and caught about 12 on DOA glo-shrimp, baby bass color Zoom Super Flukes, and red/green Bass Assassins. Although we did not land any giants, we saw plenty of trout well over the slot limit. In the afternoon, we moved to a second location to search for reds. We found some fish but discovered they were very spooky and not feeding aggressively. Mike was able to catch several including this fish which was tailing in less than a foot of water and inhaled his soft plastic jerk bait. Wednesday, I fished with Ron Whetstone. The wind and temperature were perfect, although some clouds hampered our ability to see in the water. The fish helped us out, however, by tailing all day long. In the morning, we searched for, and found, a school of large redfish but several other boats were already fishing them. We elected to leave these fish and find some we could have to ourselves. Fishing the east side of the Lagoon, we landed 15 reds and a dozen trout using gold Exude RT slugs, baby bass Zoom Super Flukes, Exude crabs, flies,  and DOA shrimp. Ron landed several slot and over slot fish including these: Thursday, I returned to the same area with Paul Huffman. The fish were tailing early and we unsuccessfully attempted to get them to eat a fly. After an hour or so, the reds quit tailing and were not feeding well and we worked hard to get 2 to the boat on Exude crabs. We went in search of trout and saw some gators approaching 30”. Again, the big fish would not feed but we did land about 10 slot trout and several small reds using DOA shrimp. We left the trout and moved back to the edge of the flat where we had seen the reds. As the day went on, they began to feed again and we caught several more nice fish on crabs, worms, and DOA shrimp. Throughout the day, we saw numerous boats buzzing the flats looking for schools of redfish. While doing so, they were unknowingly running over the top of hundreds of fish that were not schooled. Due to the large amount of boat traffic, the huge schools of 200-500 fish are not as common as they once were in the Mosquito Lagoon. There are flats, however, that hold many smaller schools of 20-40 fish and many more singles and pairs. Using your push pole, trolling motor, or drifting likely locations will result in many more fish than driving the flats looking for large schools. Recently, I have seen many dead gator trout with prop scars killed by the “school buzzers”. During 2 days of fishing this week, I shut off the motor in the morning and never started it again the whole day. Using the push pole, we saw and caught fish all day long. Search for areas of clean water in the 1-2 ft. depths and pay close attention to any sand holes. Use small soft plastics imitating shrimp or crabs or jerk baits. The ability to make quick accurate casts will improve your sighting to catching ratio tremendously. Even while blind casting, pick a specific area and cast to it whether it's a sand hole, wake or ripples from baitfish. If you acquire this habit instead of just throwing your bait out in any particular direction, you will be improving and practicing your accuracy with each cast. Then, when you spot a cruising or tailing fish, you will have a better chance of presenting the bait in the proper location. The majority of fish that are spotted and not caught are due to inaccurate casts and presentation not a refusal to eat. All the fish we caught this week were released. The use of barbless hooks makes releasing these fish easier on both you and the fish. The less damage and stress we cause the fish, the more chance we have to catch them again. Visit my HOME page for information on how you can experience some of the best fishing near Orlando, Florida. Full and half day charters available in the Mosquito Lagoon and the inshore salt waters of the east central Florida coast.