A “False” Neap Tide Will Ruin Your Fishing Trip

This force of nature will ruin your fishing trip and, to make things worse, cannot be predicted by tide apps. Discover what a "false" neap tide is.

How many times have you launched the boat with high hopes of smashing the trout?

Maybe you saw an excellent tide prediction and knew there would be plenty of moving water to keep them biting all day long.

But despite this prediction, the tide never moved. The water stay put and trout never turned on.

What happened?

This blog post reveals exactly that, so keep reading to learn what is a false neap tide.

What is a false neap tide?

In order to answer this question you must first know what a neap tide is: a weak tide created by opposing gravitational forces of the sun and moon, resulting in hardly any water movement.

Stagnant, non-moving water spells disaster for an inshore fishing trip, because predator species like redfish, flounder and speckled trout depend on that moving water to ambush bait.

As water flows, bait is carried along to where fish are waiting before being gulped down.

But if the water isn't flowing, most fish sit tight and wait for it to move again.

After all, fish just want to be comfortable and have something to eat, so there's no point in making anymore effort than what's needed.

So for them, a spring tide is best.

Easy Predictions

Fortunately for us, neap tides are easily predicted.

One only needs a smartphone app for tides to ascertain when these will happen.

So it's easy to avoid fishing those days or at least prepare for them.

Not So Easy Predictions

Unfortunately for us, tidal forces do not exist in a vacuum.

There are other forces in play, the most notable one being wind.

Wind direction and speed plays a huge part in determining water levels.

In fact, wind from the right direction at the right strength is enough to completely cancel out a tide, creating a "false" neap tide.

Here's an example from the Shell Beach Buoy.

How to read the above graph

The blue line represents the predicted water level, and the red line represents what actually happened.

You can see that a falling tide with a range of about 1 foot was expected to happen during the daytime, but never did.

How can you predict a false neap tide?

The next blog post covers this in detail, so be sure to subscribe by email.

You don't want to miss it, because the kind of fishing knowledge in it separates the pros from the weekend warriors.

Tight lines, y'all!