Well fall is upon us and the weather is getting better by the day with cooler mornings and evenings and the hurricane season is about over. This means we all get the chance to spend more time on the water doing what we have a passion for and enjoying the outdoors. The past storms have raised the water levels in the Indian river lagoon system and the mosquito lagoon as well. The fall mullet run is in full force and there are times when you can actually see acres of mullet in the river and lagoon. The water temperature is hovering in the hi 70's to low 80's and this means the mullet are here for the next month or so and will stay until the temperature falls to the low 60's on the water. Calm mornings are gretting us with tailing redfish that are agressively striking topwater lures and ambushing flies with wild abandon. Soft plastics worked around the schools of mullet have produced fish on almost every trip. Colors like smoking shad and alwife, another baitfish color are light on the bottom dark on top are about as close as you can get to mimic the mullet. My second choice is the gold spoon and I can say that more fish have been landed on the spoon than any other lure on my trips. As the water cools even more the spoon will be a consistant bet for targeting redfish in both lagoon systems. With the higher water levels the breeder or trophy fish have moved to deeper water and are typically spawning this time of year. I recently found a group of over 1000 fish in the middle of nowhere and they were happy and eagerly took topwater lures worked just past the group. Targeting the bigger fish will require spending a lot of time on the water and fishing areas that they are not typically found in during the regular season. Fishing areas with 5 to 7 feet of water have been a good place to start near creek mouths and inshore bars for finding these trophys. Slot sized fish are grouped up pretty good and catching several fish from the same area is becomming pretty consistant in the past few weeks. Several trips have resulted in catching over 20 fish in the same spot using this method.

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