With the temps being hot the water’s hot so you’ve gotta go deep. Earlier this week I fished with Keith, Gene, Wade and Amy and to be honest this was the first day we were able to fish on Tampa Bay since returning from Boca Grande. We tried to go out and scout prior to the trip but Mother Nature had other plans. Our morning started out with Amy landing a 12 pound triple tail on our first cast. Then we were off to one of my favorite snapper holes. We caught a limit of snapper between 1-1/2 and 3 pounds, not too shabby for inside the bay. Then we were after the silver king or should I say prince because the fish we were targeting are in the ten to thirty pound range but on light tackle and ten pound test line they are awesome. We jumped ten or eleven and landed one that was around twenty pounds.
The Mangrove Snapper bite is on all over the bay as well as the Spanish mackerel bite.
The bait of choice is as with everything this time of year is green backs, pilchards, or whitebait or scaled sardines they are all the same critter. Just anchor up on a rock pile and start chumming. Run a couple of flat lines out the back, a couple on the bottom and hold on. Another tip is on you flat lines run with long shank hooks as the mackerel are rather toothy critters and this will help alleviate some of the cut offs. Once catching a mackerel cut him in half and cast up current with a heavy rod and the man in the gray suit will be more that happy to play. There are literally thousands of sharks in the bay during this time of year.
Be sure to check us out on Saturdays at 6:30 am and Sundays at 11:00 am for The Reel Animals Fishing Show on New Channel 8 and call on Sundays from 8-10am to 1040 ESPN Radio for a chance to win some cool fish gear. Please visit us on the web @ www.reelanimalsfishingshow.com or call 1-866 GAMEFISH and until next time “Do yourself a favor and take a kid fishin’.”
