With the air temps falling quickly after dark and the daytime highs in the 60’s and 70’s, this is the time of year that is most productive for bottom fishing. The fish know exactly what time it is… with the daylight hours getting shorter and shorter and the water temps dropping everyday. This is the time of year that when you can leave the inlet after work, even with the shortened daylight hours, and be home by dark with a “limit” of gags for dinner. During the beginning of October, the gags can be caught within eyesight of the buildings on the beach. You can only legally retain one (1) gag grouper per person, per day, so with a handful of grunts pinkies and “endangered” sea bass, you can certainly go home with some very healthy dinners on a short trip.
Another by-product of the cooling water on the beach, is the light line bite of kings, cobia and possible dolphin, depending on water temps during the month. Many trips in the past, the light line bite has been a distraction to bottom fishing. Put it this way, we had to stop putting it out to be able to bottom fish…. if you put another (frozen or live) cigar minnow on the weightless tackle out, it was quickly eaten by another king. Cobia are not only on the surface, they are typically caught on the bottom on live baits in the fall. A great bait for the cobia is a live offering like a gruss grunt, pinfish or menhaden on a (crab) decoy jig…. the same exact bait a terminal tackle that is deadly effective on the fall gags.
As a rule of thumb in the early fall hunt for gags, look in the 65-75 ft. water first around structure or ledges and/or bait. If you locate a large stack of bait, you may be on the ultimate bait source. Drop in with the sabiki, and see who’s home. Chances are in October, these are cigars and sardines. These can be the most deadly baits os all, but there is a problem with using live cigs and sardines on the bottom is the ever present (endangered) sea bass. If you find that you can’t keep the bass of the cigs and sardines, it’s time to start dropping down the live grass grunts and pinfish.
I hope you have a great October,
Capt. Tim Barefoot
910.264.9118
www.BarefootCatsandTackle.com
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