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Fishing Report: The Nature Coast of Florida, Inshore-to twelve miles out and offshore fishing
August heat turns into September mix and match. The magic is in the air temperatures. Cold fronts are going to change our fishing from dog days of summer to fall fishing. Look for the beginning of fall on the weather channel to start in Canada and watch it progress to Florida. When you see the stronger cold fronts change the water temperatures then the fishing will start to pick up. No one knows when this will happen but I have seen it happen as early as September in years past.
Fishing has been a real big problem for the people who go grouper digging. A major amount of fuel has been consumed looking for productive rocks. Most of the rocks in the twenty to forty foot areas are bear. Larger rock piles with any amount of grass next to them are producing some nice grouper. The problem is each rock is miles away from the other and at the price of fuel you have to do your homework to minimize long travel times. One trick is when you get to a rock pile try chumming. The grouper are tight to the cover and the chum will make them come out of the rocks to feed. Lighter leaders and smaller hooks and little or no terminal tackle like snap swivels. This is your best bet when the water is this warm.
I just did a fishing trip to the middle grounds for fun with Capt Eric from Dixie Lee Bait and Tackle and his two sons that run a backwater fishing guide service called Double Trouble. We made the one hundred mile trip one way in hopes of catching our limit of grouper and snapper. Well the middle grounds is a vast place to fish and we did manage to catch Amber jacks which we released a big Bonito a major size shark also released and four keeper red grouper. No gag grouper, no snapper. I have to say the day was wonderful but thinking about replacing the one hundred gallons of fuel didn’t make me happy at the prices we are paying. Another interesting thing we discovered is the amount of stuff floating out there. We came across a military fuel tank of about twenty foot long that looked like a bomb but when we approached it we could smell the fuel, so we reported it and left the area. Large trees are bouncing just breaking the surface some are marked by trash sticking to them. If you are going to fish the waters in this area, I would recommend you to either plan your trips for daylight hours or have good radar equipment and even then be careful as radar of the best quality will not detect an underwater object.
Shallow water grouper for catch and release with an occasional keeper size is really doing well. Hopefully the people who catch these juvenile fish are careful to release the fish unharmed. Large healthy trout are starting to be caught in shallower waters as well as great snook fishing just south of Hernando beach. Red fishing is about as good as it gets. I guess all great inshore fishing is due to the net ban and a state agency that really knows how to manage the fishery.
Captain Frank Bourgeois |
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