by Capt. Bart Marx
Hello fellow anglers, the hot days of summer are here. This is the time of year that we have those nasty afternoon T-boomers. Keep close watch for those that may affect you. This time of year is great snapper fishing along the S.W. coast on some of the near-shore reefs and natural bottom. If you can handle the dog days of summer, the long runs offshore are productive. Starting at ten miles, out to forty, you can find some nice snapper. Yes, I know red snapper is closed, but there are plenty of mangrove, vermillion, and muttons. Then you have your red grouper that only have to be twenty inches. They seem to be somewhat bigger than that in 100+ plus feet of water.
Make the best of your long trips; if you travel around twenty miles an hour, have a trolling rod ready with a cedar plug or some fast trolling plug. You may have an opportunity to find a tuna, wahoo, or even a king mackerel at that speed. Be sure to put the clicker on, line dumps out fast with a fish dragging at twenty. Also keep an eye out for the garbage bag floating on the surface, it could be a sailfish sunning. Yes, you should have a couple of rods ready for this type of activity if you want to play tug-a-war with some of these critters. It is a long ride, but keep something in the water so you are fishing while under way to add some excitement to the trip.
For snapper fishing I like to bring some frozen baits to get started. I always bring squid to catch squirrelfish on the way out, usually about forty-five feet or so. Squirrelfish, aka sand perch, are great bait. If you foul hook one, put it on ice for cut bait later. If you have a live well keep the others alive for grouper bait. Another frozen bait I use is Spanish sardines and or frozen white bait that I have left over from an inshore trip. Frozen shrimp is a must also, thanks to Capt. Ralph who schooled me on the shrimp, (everybody eats shrimp). If you have studied how they chum in the Keys it works here too, using sand balls with chum mixed in. There are several ways to make them, but I feel they must stay intact till they land on the bottom and explode. This can be accomplished by making them firm like a dough ball. You may make them in advance and freeze them or in a bucket on board as you fish. With all this going on your tackle should be as light as possible to ensure you get lots of action. I may use a heavier rod and line, but scale down to twenty-pound leader about six feet or so. I like a knocker rig, it works well, and some like a chicken rig, they produce too.