Entering Into a Summer Pattern
By now we have warm water pushed into the inshore waters as well as the offshore bottom. Now is the time to push off into the deeper water for all the grouper and snapper. The scamp and red bite should be in full swing by now with the occasional HUGE gag mixed in. June has always been a great time to load up on the scamps and yellowmouths in the 125 foot water and deeper. I might suggest that someone stay on a sabiki for as long as needed to insure plenty of live bait for the scamps and yellowmouths as they can be pretty picky at times. Certainly, a (large) live cigar minnow or sardine is “scamp candy”…for sure, but understand that everything out there has a mouth large enough to eat these precious sabiki baits. The only way to overcome this is to use a bait large enough to eliminate the trash bites, like grunts, pinkies and sea bass. For the red grouper, anything will work just fine, but for the scamps, pinfish and sailors choice are best. Typically, you will bring up more grass grunts or tomtates on the sabiki from the bottom, but keep working different depths from 50 feet deep to the bottom for different species. Try marking your line on the sabiki rod to be able to go back to the same depth over and over, if you are catching the desired species. The only bait I would suggest you not use is a ring tail. If you are not familiar with what a ring tail looks like, look it up and understand they must taste bad, or some other reason, but grouper and big snapper will rarely eat a ring tail.
To me, bait selection is one of the most important things of all. (Only proper anchoring is more important than bait selection.) Granted, Frozen cigs and sardines have caught more grouper than all the other stuff combined, but that was before we had all those “endangered” sea bass overwhelming every piece of bottom from Virginia to Georgia. Full disclosure… the largest gag I ever caught was on two whole squid, just trying to finish off an opened box of squid… That is the exception, rather than the rule. Typically, the larger (older and wiser) grouper will go for the live baits.
The beauty of fishing the deeper water is the variety of species available in addition to the size. Some of those “once in a lifetime” gags live in the deeper water and rarely see any fishing pressure. In addition to the grouper, the larger snappers are out there now as well. From now till late fall, most of tropical snapper species like cuberas , mutton and others will be there.
Be careful to abide to bag limits If you have the weather/seas, and kids old enough to make a trip to the deeper water, I strongly suggest you include the younger anglers on these trips, as these are the memories (photos and film footage) that will last a lifetime.
All the best fishing,
Capt. Tim Barefoot
barefootfishing.net