Inshore Fishing Report
Snook action is the cornerstone of our inshore report right now! They have moved back into our passes and onto the beaches HARD lately. Now we are a long way from the inundation of the snook like we see most of our summer, but we are definitely seeing good concentrations of fish at the peak feeding times around the solunar major and minors. I find around the pass they are most active in the wee hours of the morning. If you are able to get out before sunrise around 4-7am you are going to have the best luck at finding cooperative fish, especially if you coincide that with one of the major or minor solunars. Â
Redfish action concentrating a bit lately with more schooling fish being found around the area. We are finding more around the area structures and such too. Often we are find a handful around the docks of the passes using live shrimp on the bottom. Â
Trout action still holding out with some nice fish being found despite the warming water temps. Great time to get out there and try and find some trout in the 3-4ft range as they push a bit deeper with warming waters. We are also finding a good number of them at night around the dock lights and bridge lights of local passes too. Â
Pompano are biting well, but extremely sporadic around the area. We see them on the sandy edges of the flats, but also around the sandy passes, and along our beautiful beaches too! They are caught with live shrimp on the bottom, but most commonly the pompano jigs are used to target them on the beaches and around the bay area bridges, piers and jetties. Â
Tarpon are showing up in decent numbers around the bay area bridges tackling the white bait mostly lately. We are seeing them on big threadfins and also the live crabs. Great time to go get you an early in the year tarpon before they become more heavily targeted. Â
Sharks are becoming more and more common around the area too, we are starting to see more of the smaller sharks as waters warm. In the cooler months we still have plenty of sharks, but they are more spread out and typically much larger. As the water warms, we see a flood of the smaller juvenile sharks and much more concentrated pockets of sharks! Â
Mackerel action is really thick around the area. We are seeing a lot of mackerel around the piers, jetties, and passes. Even some deeper flats are holding mackerel with lots of baits present and moving water. The local bridges especially in deeper areas with bountiful baits are holding acres of the macks with some bluefish and bonita mixed in with the mackerel too!
Nearshore Fishing Report
Hogfish action has slowed a bit but were still getting nice hogfish on a variety of trips. They are biting well around that 40-60ft range of depth on the lighter tackle and live shrimp. We are targeting them still on our half days and even the all day trips, but we have seen a big upswing in the red grouper action. That has incentivized us to stay a bit deeper and really target the red grouper around that 70-100ft range on our ten hour trips and in that range we are finding some big lanes and nice mangrove snapper numbers too! Great time to get out there and enjoy the changing near shore action while we are still catching the cooler water species like the hogfish but also seeing some nice warmer water action with the red grouper. Â
Lane snapper love the cut squid and we are seeing them on the squid, but they really bite well on the live shrimp so even while the hogfish are slowing the shrimp are still a great idea for big lane snapper and solid mangrove snapper. Â
The red grouper near shore love a big threadfin or large strip of squid. They love the live bait too, and I recommend starting to think about bringing a dozen or two of pinfish out with you to target the red grouper on the ten hour all day fishing trips.
Fishing Report
The deep water closure is coming to a close which means we now have the flexibility to fish deeper and virtually wherever we want! Great time to get out there and capitalize on the great action for fat red grouper and more. We are going to be targeting the red grouper, but enjoying big triggerfish, chance for solid scamp, and finding those large mangrove snapper too. Â
The yellowtail snapper were HOT this past 39 hour trip with endless numbers of them coming up with solid mangrove action. The mangroves were a bit smaller than we would like but we loved the solid numbers of decent yellowtails that helped offset the smaller average sized mangroves. Â
Pelagic action continues to warm up with the weather. We should see a big push of blackfin tuna anytime now. We are already seeing some nice wahoo caught around the area. The kingfish should get more active and we have seen a few sailfish caught and released too!
