Florida done ruint me

That seems to be the best way to summarize my week trip to Okeechobee and the Everglades. It has "ruint" bream fishing for me. We left last Friday at 7 am and stayed at a hotel in Davenport Fla where my fishing buddy, Rick, joined us to make 4 boats and 8 guys. The next day we went into Clewiston to the Roland Martin Marina and resort. This is a fishing town, even the lights on the street poles have fish on them

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We had planned to fish the "O" for bream and then go to the Glades for Oscars, but the fishing was slow on the lake and high winds made it difficult, so we headed to the Everglades and put in at Everglades Holiday Park, a popular tourist gateway to the glades via dozens of airboat tours, which we were subject to off and on. I must be in 50 different people's cameras as they snapped pictures of us fishing the canals.
I was suspicious of my friends claim that they bought crickets by the thousands, but the first day he bought 3000 and put them a "cricket condo" which they brought with them. All told we used about 7000. Attachment 158410

We hit the mother lode as the Oscars were biting fast and furious and we caught between 500 and 600 the first day. Note these are an invasive species like the white perch are to us and the DNR wants as many removed as possible. We did our share. Here is my cooler from one day's fishing.
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Below the cooler shot is a strange looking catfish I caught. He went back in, wasn't sure what he was. The next fish is a beautiful transplant called a Mayan Cichlid. They are intermixed with the Oscars and both species are delicious to eat.
The next cooler shot is a 48 qt. cooler filled with fillets from one days fishing. The next shot is the Oscar which was our main target. Most weighed around a pound, with several going to 2 pounds. As I said this has certainly tainted my view of typical bream fishing in SC. These guys are like having a 5 lb hybrid bream/striper mix on your line. I found the perfect outfit for them was my 10 ft. B&M jig pole with 12# braided line. We used slip corks and crickets initially, but later caught them on Beetle Spins and even one on a small crank bait.
Good news was there is an excellent cleaning station at the marina and all 8 of us could work at once. These guys have been coming down here for 34 years so the had a routine down pat and it did not take as long as you might think to clean that many fish, but still 2 hours one day was a lot of work.
We left Clewiston at 4 this morning and I pulled into my house at 4 this afternoon. It was a long drive but worth every minute and was a lot of fun. We quit each day by 2 so we could come back and clean the fish and relax a bit before we ate dinner. (It was a 60 mile drive to the Everglades from our condo but once you leave Clewiston, there is no place to stay) We cooked at the condos each night and I probably gained a pound or two that I don't need.

Here are some more shots from our trip. We were fishing down in the lily pads so the braided line eliminated most break offs.

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[/ATTACH]These guys are so well organized they handed out plastic aprons each day. Believe me you needed oneAttachment 158416Attachment 158417Attachment 158418Attachment 158419Attachment 158420
This last picture is of Rick in the Rim Canal which circles the lake. This was on the first day, before the wind ran us to the glades.

Looks like y'all had a great time!! Has to be a awesome time catching the Oscars that size. Great report and awesome pics of the week, congrats.

Sounds like you may go back oscar fishing, they are a lot of fun to catch. Next time you go try jigs for the oscars they work real well and catch bigger fish. Thanks for the story and the great pic, hope to get back their one more time myself.

Sounds like a worthwhile trip. Glad it was a good one for all. :fish

Really enjoyed your post....great pictures

Good job. Thanks for sharing.

Sounds like alot of fun. Maybe I should look into fishing for oscars one of these days. Thanks for sharing your trip.:)

Wow! What a trip. Thanks for the great pictures and story

Wow! Now that's a great report! Thanks for taking the time to thoroughly record this for us.

Was the fishing great because of the spawn or do they bite year round?