By: Capt. Bart Marx
Depending on the weather this would be a great time to head offshore. Out in 100 feet of water you may encounter some nice size yellow tail snapper. Find an artificial reef and get anchored up on it so you may chum and pull the fish away from the structure. While you are chumming have some rods ready with just a hook and leader. This is when you need to be patient, you can put some baits down like squid or sardines and shrimp. This will keep you busy but continue to keep an eye on your chum and watch for the snapper to come up to the surface. This is when I’ll put a piece of cut bait on the rod with just a hook and drop it overboard. Leave your bail open and let the bait sink the same speed as your chum and watch the line as it comes off the spool. When the line starts to fly off your spool flip the bail, hold on, and when the line comes tight it will be a challenge to get the fish to the boat. Chumming attracts all types of fish including shark and barracuda. In our area, find some hard bottom or some small ledges you may even catch a keeper red grouper, and in a little closer to shore around 70 feet you may also get some lane snapper, porgies and white grunts. Closer to shore around 40 feet of water on some natural bottom you may find sheepshead and flounder. Depending on the migration of the bait fish you may find some spanish mackerel. Spanish mackerel get thick in the passes where you could setup a rig with a jig and a spoon. This is like a chicken rig just tie the jig on the shorter leader and a jig on the longer leader. This technique is very productive if you can see the schools feeding on the surface. I like to set up a couple of these rigs and troll them around the edges of the schools of feeding mackerel and as I work our way inshore there should be plenty of red action they may be under the mangroves or out on the flats in the sand holes waiting for an unsuspecting bait to swim by, where I will use some cut bait in the sand holes like fresh lady fish or even half of a crab and let them soak and they can smell that in the water. Give us a call if you would like to have a personal training session with Capt. Bart Marx and learn how we get it done!