My trout tipped the scales at a shade over six pounds and I found myself entertaining serious thoughts of getting it mounted. I mentioned this idea to Bruce—busy releasing a fish of almost identical size—and with an impish grin he said to hold off a little while because he had a feeling we’d catch some even bigger.

Boatt ramp is fairly quiet this time of year.

Bruce wasn’t jesting. In four hours we caught and released 32 trout, all above the slot limit with the biggest weighing seven pounds, two ounces and measuring 29 inches. These were heavy fish—evidently full of roe going into the spawning season. We did manage to catch seven beneath the high side of the slot limit (15 to 20 inches; bag limit 5 in these waters) and I was able to take home a few fillets.

It was one of those rare fishing days when everything was perfect, but in talking to other anglers and reading reports, I know we witnessed a good example of how trout fishing has improved along this stretch of Florida coastline. For Bruce, who’s tuned in to the Keaton Beach flats, it was a routine day. Like many anglers here, he credits the net ban and good enforcement to back it up. The way things are going, in another year or two Bruce thinks that 10-pounders won’t be uncommon.

In my boyhood days I fished these same waters and most of the time my daddy and I tagged along with an old commercial fisherman by the name of Bill Kirby. Mister Bill had a small shack not far from where Bruce and I were fishing and his method was to fish with half a dozen long Calcutta poles all at the same time. I would often watch in amazement as he worked the poles by slapping them in the water to attract trout, mackerel or bluefish. At times he would use artificial baits but for the most part he used cutbait, so the first order of business was to catch a bunch of pinfish when we arrived at one of his favorite grassflats.

Mister Bill didn’t need a whole lot to get by on, but he always managed to catch trout, using the same method day in and day out. We would make our drifts close to him. Bill always protected the area he planned to drift, never running the motor through the fishing zone—just as Bruce and I did on that spring day off Keaton Beach. At the end of a drift, a wide returning loop returns you to productive waters.

More than the look of the Keaton Beach waterfront has changed since those early days. In all of the many times we fished these same flats alongside Mister Bill, not once did we catch a spotted trout that weighed over four pounds.

Enjoying the resurgence of big trout in these waters, Bruce and I fished from Hagin’s Cove north to Yates Creek and Rock Island (Mr. Bill’s favorite honeyhole was the grassflats off of Rock Island). The shoreline is productive throughout this stretch, but it’s critical that you pay close attention to tides and plan your trip so you will have plenty of water to get to and from your fishing waters. It can get mighty shallow in close to the shore. If you’ve never fished the Keaton Beach area, you might hire one of the fine local guides the first time out.

FS