With Labor Day approaching, there will be a lot of boats on the water, and many end up in the same places. Large structures offer a place where eight or ten boats could easily carry three people per boat for a weekend day trip that produces time on the water, time together, and maybe even a fish or two. This Trip Plan for the Howard Frankland applies to all the bridges in the bay, with some specific tips included. A Fishy Spot map for the trip can be found in the "Reports" section of the left navigation bar. Like all Fishy Spot maps, they're only available to the public for a while, after which they're only available to our registered readership.

The idea of fishing structure is the basis of just about every article we write about catching (or learning to find, more importantly) fish. Whether we're talking about how to best drift a flat or where to position a boat in order to effectively fish residential docks, we're talking structure. The one exception to that general rule is when we're talking about open water predators. If you're fishing for Kingfish or Mackerel or Albacore in the waters in that vast fishery directly outside the Skyway, or chasing Jacks, Bluefish, or Ladyfish to put clients (or friends) onto anywhere in the bay or on the beaches, you're not dealing with structure to any great extent.

You can see this fact from the Fishy Spots feature of our site. They all provide something critical to our target species: a place to sit and wait for bait to come to them.

Think about it. If you're eating something that's good at getting away from you, wouldn't it make sense to sit somewhere the bait HAD to pass your face? When the tide's coming in, the fish sit on the north side of structure; even before the slack tide turns into full-blown outgoing, they've long moved onto the south sides of the exact same structure. They're moving from side to side as often as they are from piling to piling or bar to bar.

Derick Burgos, the Kayak Fishing ClassicS Series Leader, hooked third place in the fly fishing division at the Pecks, Ozello Redfish Slam Classic on August 28^th, 2010. Derick, sponsored by Slot Limit Radio, only managed one fish for the day. It was enough to take third in the photo release kayak fishing series and earn enough points to keep the challengers behind him and still control the Series Lead. Derick has fished eight of the scheduled ten open events and that has helped him greatly. He, like most anglers, has experienced some slow days over the past eight months but his resolve has paid off thus far. He leads the school of anglers by 370 Series Points which puts Chuck Statham right on his paddle wake and closing. Statham has slammed the last three ClassicS’ and Burgos has faltered from his usual top performance. The mark of a true champion is how well he does at the finish and the competition in the Kayak Fishing ClassicS Series is lining up to cast their fate.