History of Ft. Desoto
Fort Desoto is a place that's been attracting campers and fishers for a long time; there are scientists that venture to say as many as 10,000 years. We do know that for the last 400 years our entire region's attracted a wide array of western and world travellers. At first those travellers met the Tocaba Indians -- the latest tribe we have some vague information about. They had been here since roughly 1,000 A.D. The indians, who interacted with the more well-known Weedons, occupied Mullet key -- where the park sits -- and close-by barrier islands. Their diets consisted mostly of seafood, wild plants, and a deer or pig once in a while. They were more fishers than hunters,though, and there's little indication they harvested in any structured way.
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The fishery at Ft. Desoto isn't a secret to anybody; there have been anglers seeking tarpon, snook, flounder, shark, sheepshead, redfish, ladyfish, bluefish, jack, pompano and permit, cobia, and who-knows what else more than 5,000 years ago, and it was Robert E. Lee that first mapped it -- before he left to serve the Confederacy.
There are still "kitchen" mounds throughout the area, which is comprised of five different small islands (keys): Madelaine key, Saint Jean Key, Saint Christopher Key, and the main island, known as Mullet key. You could easily find pottery shards there after a good rain, when odd artifacts seem to rise to the surface of current times.
Home to the Tocaba
Looking at a chart or map, it's easy to see why it was populated by indigenous peoples, who lived on the seafood offered by this strong tidal spot. The same thing that drew ancients here still makes it the outstanding fishery it can be at times; the fact that it's the tightest spot -- the 'throat' so-to-speak -- of the entire bay.
This map -- courtesy of Pinellas Country -- shows the location of the park from above. This FishySpot article covers the area, which is an excellent place to fish from shore. Camping is encouraged on the island(s), and many locals grew up fishing here before there were official campgrounds. You can schedule camping trips online at the park, and at times this park produces the best shore-bound fishery in the area. The park and the flats around are a prime target for our region's waders.
On April 15th of the year of our Lord 1528, the first European to visit the Sunshine State set foot somewhere between Clearwater and Saint Pete Beach. A Spaniard by the name of Pánfilo de Narváez, he and his group of Conquistadores began an exploration of the barrier islands before continuing on his trip up the coast. On May 30th of the following year, a more well-known of the Spanish movers-and-shakers by the name of Hernando Cortez walked along the ridge lines of what is today Bellair Bluffs.
Cortez was looking for more of what he had found and pillaged from South America: gold (literally by the tons). The mesquitos Cortez found there -- made from that gold -- were quickly melted into ingots. (Along with Aztec culture, which wasn't a gift itself; they had special wars to collect human sacrifices). Interestly, they tore the hearts out of living men, and sacrified children by the 100's to the Sun god in early April every year, but they had no word in their language for "Orphan".
Fortunately, Cortez didn't find more glory in the forests and hills of what would become the Southeastern United States, and devoid of native cultures. He died in what's now Alabama from 'fever' and was put to rest somewhere near or actually in the Mississippi river 'to protect his remains from the natives'.
Called a "Gorge", early hooks were wrapped in meat and put into the water on handlines woven from gut or hair. The fish would eat the meat, and what would eventually become a 'barb' would keep the artifact from being removed. Metal hooks had shown up a thousand years before these primitive (but very effective) local hooks in both China and the Middle East. There's evidence of sport fishing as far back as 70 AD or so -- but that's for another story.
The Fort...
You can't miss the fort, and as many people come to look only to look at the ruins as come to take advantage of the incredible fishery. The fort was approved by the Secretary of Defense after being pressured by -- among others -- local resident Henry Plant. The influential railroad baron -- who was also a very giving man to our region's communities -- was among a growing group of locals that felt the bay needed protection from what was quickly becoming a dangerous Carribean. The Spanish-American war broke out soon afterwards. Another FishySpot article we've written for our site talks, in fact, about the Rough Riders and their campgrounds near downtown Tampa.
Among the engineers first anchoring offshore of what's now Mullet Key (in winter of 1859) was a Brevard Colonel by the name of Robert E. Lee. The team identified what's now the park and its surrounding keys as the ideal location for a fort to defend the bay.
The fort itself sits on Mullet Key. If you check out the "Boat Ramps" menu under the "Where" tab, you'll see that there's a ramp on the islands, so if you're using a boat, or want to combine camping, wading, and boating in your trip plans, you can drop it right on the islands and avoid the insanity you might find on any given weekend at the more popular ramps.
This shot -- from our map of all the State's Boat Ramps in Florida is one of dozens of things you might find helpful for planning a fishing trip. They're especially useful if it's your intent to fish these "FishySpot" trip maps. They have been proven effective, but like anything, planning is critical.
You might take note -- as many of our readers have already done -- that the Google data on Florida's boat ramps fails to show that they're no longer free. As soon as their online data is updated it will show here -- the maps we use on TheOnlineFisherman.com are "live"; meaning that the data you see here is what's streaming to all browsers anywhere on the planet.
Fishing the Park's Islands...
There's more than one fishery on the islands that comprise the park, and there is more than one way to fish it. Since we're going to be talking about the spot as a Shore Bound FishySpot, we're going to stay away from approaches to the park and it's flats (and channels) from a boat. On the other hand, you can stand on the beach here at night, and put a Jack-half or Albacore head on the bottom and catch shark that could take you to Cancun before they let go or give up. And as we just talked about a moment ago, there's a ramp right on the islands where you can launch your boat as part of your trip plan.
Tampa Bay's unique for a variety of reasons -- not the least of which is how shallow it is. The average depth of the bay is a little over six feet, and when we suffer the loss of a human being on our bay in a fishing related accident (a few years ago a fireman drowned throwing a castnet underneath the Howard Frankland Bridge) it seems insane that the victims didn't simply try to back-paddle until they could stand up.
At Fort DeSoto Park, however, you can stand in six inches of water next to one of the hottest year-round fisheries in for a hundred miles: Bunces Pass. Look close at the Online Navigation Tool we built into the site (from the incredible engineers at NCEarth.com) when we first decided that the community could benefit from an OnlineFisherman-like site.
FishySpots are based on structure; and if you want to find structure, the place to do it is on Fort Desoto. The ability to stand in knee-deep water next to Bunce's Pass -- a flowing pipe of water holding every imaginable species we could ever think of (and a few we're not thinking of seeing). Fishing Bunces is something people attempt to do in $100 thousand boats all the time. You can walk there in the park.
You'll see from the actual FishySpot map files that come with this article and mailing that there are fish to be caught on every side, but among the hottest -- and most natural -- places to start your trip map is on the northern edge of Mullet Key -- where you can literally put baits on the bottom in 20 feet of fast-moving water while standing on the beach.
We've long been fans of using GoogleEarth as a fishing tool. This image is from our free online navigation tool. The perfect chart shows true measured depths, and when laid on top of imagery like GoogleEarth -- which is what's happening here -- you have exactly what you need to create your own trip plans.
If you've used our FishySpot maps before, or know anything about them, you'll know that our goal is to teach you why fish populate certain areas. Teaching you that casting parallel to the shoreline, and "fanning" your retrieves out so you cover half a 350-degree circle as you walk the beach hunting snook is what's important. Not that it works oh-so-well on the western beaches of this incredible ridge of gravel and fossilized shell. It's gonna work on the beaches of Madeira just like it will work here. When you use our maps, look around you. Watch the depths; listen to the wind, and study the tides. Keep a fishing journal. All of those things, and a thousand more -- when mixed with components of a web site like this one -- can make you a more effective fisher.
As is the case with all of our FishyMaps Trip Plans, each of these articles come with a GoogleEarthPro map attached (and available on the FishySpots menu on the left navigation tool). At the end of the ten days, the maps (which can be downloaded from the About>User Downloads menu) are only available to our registered users.
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