# St. Joe Bay



## Alligator (Mar 18, 2012)

My buddy and I got tired of waiting for Choctawhatchee Bay to clear, we decided to make a scallop / flounder trip to St Joe Bay. We got on the water about 2:00 pm, and picked up about a half pint of scallops until dark. We started floundering we saw 200 tracks! Water was clear. 3 flounder and 6 mullet and 20 crabs (no I didn't gig them, I built a crab grabber, with the help of Mr Cosson) until midnight. About 2:00 am we ran to a guy gigging and stop to talk. He gave us the mullet he had, because he needed room in his ice chest. He must have had 40 flounder. He said he saw us at the mouth of the bay, we saw him, and he jumped us about a mile and we floundered in his wake for 5 hours. We made it home with 28 crab, 26 mullet, 4 flounder, and a half pint of scallops. I don't feel right about complaining but something wasn't just right that. Nice enough guy, gave us the mullet, had a commercial license, but he vacuumed the bottom in front of us. ???


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## Flounder9.75 (Sep 28, 2007)

After a little while of seeing beds and no fish should have been a clue. 


To Move Somewhere Else


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## Five Prongs Of Fury (Apr 15, 2008)

As soon as I seen him skip ahead I would've moved on to greener pastures.


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## panhandleslim (Jan 11, 2013)

These commercial guys don't play around. It's dog eat dog with them. I was wade fishing for trout, one morning, in upper Escambia Bay and just happened to be having an excellent morning. About that time, a guy running commercial crab traps came up in his boat and as he hooked the crab bouy, he left his boat in gear with the motor healed all the way over and just kept circling until he had emptied, rebaited and re-deployed the crab trap. Once he got the trap off the bottom, his circle began to drift until his 'running' boat was right in my casting radius. He didn't say anything and I didn't say anything so, I figured his rational is that he is working for a living and since I am out there for recreation, he can behave any way he wishes and that's just the way it is. 

I understood that he needed to work the pot but I think he could have shut down until finished and then cranked up and moved on. Not all commercial guys are like that. It always brings up the question: Arrogance or Ignorance.


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## Alligator (Mar 18, 2012)

We are somewhat new to floundering. It was our first flounder trip to St. Joe, we didn't know the territory. He went around a bend and stayed far enough ahead that we didn't come close to catching him. We were catching crabs, and gaming mullet. (slow real slow, mullet slow down to stay in the light, when you speed up suddenly, they don't notice, and they come back to you) Don't get me wrong I had fun! Just when I got home with 4 flounder, and the rest, having seen the 40 flounder, I felt like someone pissed on my shoes. 

There were lots of rays, and just thought the football shaped tracks were ray tracks. (We're still new)


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## panhandleslim (Jan 11, 2013)

Heh, he flipped you a bone (or a few mullet) but make no mistake about it, you got Hoodoo'ed.


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## Alligator (Mar 18, 2012)

panhandleslim said:


> Heh, he flipped you a bone (or a few mullet) but make no mistake about it, you got Hoodoo'ed.


Yea, I know. What goes around comes around. And, I don't depend on flounder for a living. Thankfully


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## k-dog (May 15, 2013)

so I want to try scalloping there but if you only got 2 pints it must have not been good or was the two pints cleaned scallops???


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## HotSoup (Jan 2, 2013)

Can you post a pic of your crab grabber?


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## johnboatjosh (May 19, 2008)

Wow. 40? You see them or that's what he said?

Not doubting you, just asking. Everyone else I've talked to has been struggling down there lately. 40 would be an accomplishment for sure!


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## Alligator (Mar 18, 2012)

We saw them. He had them in the floor of the boat and in the cooler, the mullet he gave us were in the bottom of the cooler he pulled 20 floinder off the top of the mullet and dumped the mullet in our cooler. He counted the ones he pulled from the cooler. There had to be at least 20 on the floor of the boat before he opened the cooler. He got rid of the mullet to make room for the flounder on the floor.


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## Alligator (Mar 18, 2012)

HotSoup said:


> Can you post a pic of your crab grabber?


 Yea if will stop raining for 10 minutes. So I don't get soaked! It has rained continuiously sents I woke up this morning.

In the mean time here is what I made it from. (a 70" snake catcher) I bought off Ebay and cut in the thickest part of the catcher and drilled taped a 1/4 hole in the end I cut off. Jim Cosson made the stainless forks, one 3 prong and one 4 prong with 1/4 stainless bolt welded on. It works like a champ. I made him a drawing of the prongs. If he doesn't have it I will post it or send it to anyone that wants it.
The yellow line is approxamently where I cut it.


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## Alligator (Mar 18, 2012)

k-dog said:


> so I want to try scalloping there but if you only got 2 pints it must have not been good or was the two pints cleaned scallops???


 We only got half a pint. We got there after 2:00 pm there were so many boats they had already covered all the good areas. We got those combing the grass with our fingers. If you want scallops go early. 2 pints is the limit, I think per boat. Thats cleaned! Thats a lot of scallops! Probably a a 100 lb peanut sack full, maybe more. It is a hell of a lots of shucking. It is no secret behind Black Island in PSJB,a huge grass flat. Any weekend there will be 100 - 200 boats. The water is knee to waist deep. Snorkel and mask, fins if you wish. You need some kind of mesh bag. Dive in. Better jump, too shallow to dive.


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## johnboatjosh (May 19, 2008)

Alligator said:


> We saw them. He had them in the floor of the boat and in the cooler, the mullet he gave us were in the bottom of the cooler he pulled 20 floinder off the top of the mullet and dumped the mullet in our cooler. He counted the ones he pulled from the cooler. There had to be at least 20 on the floor of the boat before he opened the cooler. He got rid of the mullet to make room for the flounder on the floor.


Wow, that's awesome! Town side or cape side if you don't mind saying?


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## Alligator (Mar 18, 2012)

Pictures of crab grabber


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## tank banger (Oct 2, 2012)

Wow that crab grabber is awesome!!!:thumbup:


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## Faithnfishin (Dec 5, 2010)

Let us no how if works, I hope it does well for you.


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## Alligator (Mar 18, 2012)

*let us know*

It does great we have used it 5 or 6 times and never come home without crabs. I wish I could say the same for flounder!
We have been working on it sents last year. We started with a HF can grabber. The problem with it was the big crabs, the ones you want would grab the stalk and push out. This is the semi-final product, at least the final concept. Out of approx. 30 attempts we came home with 25 crabs. 2 or 3 of the misses were in holes or tires or some other obstruction. With the skinny prongs the crabs don't seem th precieve them as threats, and will bo up for a fight. They only think about flight once they are in the grasp. The little ones even bo up. It will not hold the smallest ones. After cleaning the 25 or 27 it catches everything you want keep. Some of those had limited meat.


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## HotSoup (Jan 2, 2013)

Very Nice, I like it!


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