The snook were ALL OVER the Merry Pier this weekend. Several dozen were hanging in the current, just in the shade of the pier, watching the schools of baitfish. As soon as a jack or mackeral would scatter the bait, the snook would zip out from under the dock, ambusing the baitfish. A pretty impressive sight:

It’ll be interesting to see if they all vanish on September 1st. But, they are biting now, if reluctantly. Here’s a decent one caught by my friend Mike, a Merry Pier regular:

And, yes, there are still plenty of grouper hanging out, although it’s been a while since I’ve seen one big enough to keep. And snapper? Oh, yeah, they’re still thick and cooperative. Here’s the end result of a limit of mangrove snapper:

At midnight Friday, I headed down to the Merry Pier to meet up with a fishing ‘Dream Team’ – Cap’t Dick, Cap’t Brett, Joe, Pat and Rich. We headed due west in the wee hours to fish the Mike Alstott Charity Fishing Tournament. On the way out, we encountered pounding rain, but the winds stayed pretty calm throughout.

A couple of bait stops provided slim pickings, so we continued west, content in the knowledge that we had about a million pounds of frozen bait, along with dozens of pinfish and a few pass crabs. Since this was a tournament, we headed deep, stopping in about 160′ of water. The first drop was slow, so we moved to a nice ledge. BAM! Up came an American Red Snapper. Then another. And another. We kept a few of the larger ones, releasing the rest.

After a few minutes, Rich’s rod bowed over in a serious arc. Fish on! He proceeded to expertly battle a big red grouper to the gaff. It was a nice fish, around 13 pounds. The Brett hooked up on a monster. The brief fight ended with the fish snapping the 80 pound test line. The sun began to rise, the bite slowed, and we moved on.

The rest of the morning was spent in a series of deep water drops, but we just couldn’t get the big fish to bite. We managed some smaller red grouper, along with more ARS and a nice Lane Sanpper. But the big grouper proved elusive. We tried trolling for a while, hoping for a kingfish, wahoo or a blackfin tuna. We did have one nice hit, with Cap’t Dick on the rod as the drag screamed out. Alas, it proved to be just a bonita.

We dropped crabs down on a wreck, looking for permit or cobia. No dice. Even the amberjack shunned our small pinfish. I did manage a kingfish, but it measured a half inch short. On several spots, we had a great showing of fish on the bottom, but the sharks were thick and aggressive, and we lost a fair amount of tackle. Our usual mangrove snapper spots also showed fish, but lockjaw had set in. So, we popped open a beer and headed back for the weigh-in, arriving with just a few minutes to spare.

We didn’t win. We weren’t in the top 3. But, hey we all had a great time, and a cooler full of grouper, Lane, and American Red Snapper. I can honestly say I’m already looking forward to next year’s tournament.

 

I’ll be joining Joe, Dick and the gang aboard the Getaway at midnight Friday for the Mike Alstott Family Fishing Tournament. We’ll be fishing the offshore portion, targeting big snapper and grouper, and perhaps some of the whopper permit and amberjack haunting the deep water wrecks. Report to follow!

This weekend was more of the same- lots of small grouper and snapper in Pass-A-Grille. A few jacks. But, nothing too spectacular. No tarpon. No cobia. No keeper grouper. Stay tuned till next week.

So, Saturday I headed down to Merry Pier bright and early to meet with Nick and get in a little snapper and grouper fishing. Nick’s a great guy, and he was hauling in keeper mangos in no time. But, I had a little change of plans. Seems Joe, the owner of the Getaway, a Tampa Offshore Fishing Charter Boat, had an open seat. I didn’t hesitate. Soon, Joe, along with Cap’t Joe, Cap’t Dick and I were headed out offshore.

First priority was bait, which proved to be a little scarce. We wrangled in some pinfish, snapper sized sardines, blue runners and assorted others. On one of the cans in the Egmont Shipping Channel, we saw a pair of curious cobia, but they were reluctant to bite. So we headed out to a snapper spot. The first catch was a little…. weird. An octopus!

 We headed to deeper water, and in about 80″, we came upon a huge weedline. It was loaded with small bait, so we dropped a planer wih a squid spoon. We caught a couple jacks, then struck gold- Mahi Mahi! We set up next to the weedline, and started chumming. Sure enough, a huge school of dolphin (aka dorado, aka mahi-mahi) soon showed up, and the frenzy was on. Using a variety of live and frozen bait, as well as artificials, we were hauling in tasty schoolies one after another. They weren’t real big, but boy were they fun to catch on light tackle- great runs, and spectacular jumps.  We threw back the smallest, and still managed 28 keepers:

 The surprise of the trip came after the mahi mahi bite tapered off. We anchored over some bottom, and proceeded to haul up red grouper, gag grouper, scamps and even a nice lane snapper. But Joe had a big hit on a live sardine, and proceeded to pull in a doormat flounder:

 It was  a great day on the water, with plenty of action, and lots of tasty fillets. If you’re looking for a fantastic fishing adventure, call Joe at the Getaway (727) 367-9693. Tell him you found him through TampaFishing.Net.

 

 

 

Pictured above is Roger, an outstanding fisherman, with a hefty Merry Pier snook. I managed to get in a little fishing this weekend, between parties, fireworks and the beach. Seems that the bigger fish are starting to get active- I saw a nice tarpon jumped with a pinfish; a 32″ cobia landed after an epic battle; and several other big snook and grouper caught.

As for me, well, I was joined by my friend Jim, his wife Erica and their daughter Jordan on Saturday for a snapper roundup. There were plenty of mangos around, thought they tended to be on the small side. We did manage 5 keepers. But, the highlight of the day was a pair of keeper flounder, the first I’d seen in quite a while. We had an excellent fish fry Saturday afternoon.

A shout out to JayT – he was hammering the snook under the dock using frisky live Jenny’s, and snapper on live shrimp. I’m sure I’ll be down at the Merry Pier next weekend, so hopefully I’ll see you there.

Pictured above is a nice 24″ grouper my friend Mike pulled in yesterday from the Merry Pier in St. Pete Beach. It hit a live shrimp with a couple split shot about 20″ off the dock. I caught a few smaller grouper, but no keepers.

The snapper bite is red hot right now. The fish are running a little small, with most in the 9-11″ range. There are a few 12″ to 14″ fish mixed in, if you have the patience to weed through the smaller ones. They are hitting just about everything, with live shrimp and small whitebait being the top choices. I probably caught over 50 this weekend, and although I didn’t keep any, I would have had no trouble putting together a quick limit.

There are still snook hanging around the Pier, and now that the season has closed, they seem to be a lot easier to catch. Sunrise, and after dark are the best times to hook a bruiser linesider. The snook have also been active in Blind Pass. I saw one today that would have gone at least 40″.

A quick note of thanks to all the new memebers here. Now that you’re registered, you can leave comments on any story. Please feel free to do so. Thanks again!

Fishing was a little slow after the full moon, and the weekend storms didn’t help. So, I figured I’d check the statistics for Tampa Fishing. Do you realize that over the last year, this website has:

• Over 60,000 Visitors
• Over 125,000 Page Views

The average visitor spends 3 minutes, 27 seconds on the site. And, tampafishing.net ranks for, and receives search engine traffic, for over 3,500 different search terms.

So, my question is…. who’s there?  It’s free to register. You can leave comments by simply clicking the “Comments” link following each post. So, make your presence known. Ask a question. Leave a fishing report. Share a seafood recipe. Point out a spelling error. Whatever.  Just stop lurking and join TampaFishing.Net!

Cap’t Dick’s 25′ Grady White just got back from the shop, so it was time for a little shakedown cruise. Sunday morning, Joe, Pat, and I gathered at Dick’s, geared up and headed west. The Gulf was perfect – just enough breeze to keep the heat down, but not enough to kick up waves. It stayed flat the entire day- and what an AWESOME day it was!

We hit the usual bait spots, loading up on pinfish, cigar minnows and  Spanish sardines. We set out for some structure in the 100′ range that usually holds amberjack. When we arrived around noon, another boat was anchored right on the spot, hauling up fish. We motored around until the bottom finder lit up, then dropped pinfish. The amberjack were there, and they were hungry. We quickly boated our limit of these hard-fighting fish.

Next on the agenda were grouper and snapper. We headed for a nearby ledge, dropped a marker, and made a quick drift. We were quickly hammered by some big gags, so we set the anchor and proceeded to haul in red grouper, gags, and mangrove snapper. The action was steady until the tide slacked. We picked up a few more stragglers, then headed to a break in 80′ for the final stop of the day.

With two days till the full moon, the snapper were thick and hungry. We bagged some nice, tasty mangos, and added a couple more grouper to the box. The bottom was thick with fish. We threw back some big Key West grunts, triggerfish and even a yellowtail snapper, although the American red snapper remained elusive.

We arrived back at Dick’s shortly after sunset and started filleting. The final tally was:

4 Amberjack
3 Gag Grouper
1 Scamp Grouper
2 Red Grouper
11 Mangrove Snapper

Not bad for a shakedown cruise! Thanks again to Dick, Pat and Joe for an incredible fishing trip.

Lots of fish this weekend, but nothing to brag about. The summer fishing patterns are taking shape, with cooler mornings, blazing hot afternoons, and evening thunderstorms, with no fronts in sight. The haul this weekend included bluefish, blue runners, mangrove snapper, gag and red grouper, TONS of lane snapper, key west grunts (yes, they’re right off the pier!), spanish macs, and a few others that escape my recollection. Pictured above is a nice snook that slammed a frozen sardine a few feet in front of the Merry Pier. Everybody got excited during the battle, expecting a huge grouper- kinda’ funny when a snook like this is actually a bit of a disappointment!