Hopefully everyone had a great holiday season and a safe New Year. The last few weeks have been great near shore and off-shore. Sharks, cobia and triple tail have been hanging pretty close to the beach. For triple tail use a small bucktail tipped with a piece of squid or a live shrimp with just a small shot of weight on it. Tease them with it a little and most of the time they will eat it. A #4 treble hook with a live shrimp works great as well. Triple tail makes some of the best eating around. You will find them free swimming and holding to pieces of weeds, buoys and anything else you can find floating. Cobia have been hanging out in the same areas as the trips, have the bucktail with squid ready. There are many things you can use for them. If there hungry they will eat, so to speak. A bucktail tipped with a whole squid works best if you don’t have live bait.
Pushing a little farther out, Pelican and 8A have had some stud kings on them. I have been using many different baits since live bait is a little hard to find this time of year so have your dead sardines handy. If you can’t find any bunker to net, try to sabiki some off the buoys or wrecks on the way out for some blue runners or threadfins. Live bait will normally work better.
Mahi, wahoo and sails have been showing themselves. Although there’s specific tactics and ways to target each specifically, try smaller Islander lures with small ballyhoo or naked ballyhoo. All three species can be expected this time of year. Wahoo can be targeted with a little more speed in your troll. This is the time of year they are around in greater numbers. Don’t put too much effort into running the heavy gear. You will catch all these species on “king” gear on the reefs just fine. Good luck, See you out there. Capt. Chris
