Hey guys,
Today I guided Brad, his wife, and two kids from Kentucky. We left shoreline at noon and headed to the pass. The jetties were covered with boats so we fished a bunch of deep water structure in the bay. The bite was non stop throughout the afternoon. We started out with a double hookup on legal gag grouper. We were only two days away from being able to keep them! As all of you should know…. the gag grouper season opens up April 1st.
The rest of the afternoon was filled with one sheepshead bite after another. After filling our coolers with tasty sheepshead I decided to take my clients to a few docks I have in santa rosa sound to try and get a few slot reds for them… By now the wind was blowing upwards of 25MPH and it was getting a little uncomfortable on the water. We pulled up to my first dock and it was constant redfish action for the next 30 minutes. The strong winds made it hard to keep the boat in position so after boating a number of quality slot reds we headed back to clean fish.
I have found lately that the outgoing tide in that deep water makes for a much more consistant bite. As of the last two weeks, the fish seem to shut down a little on an incoming tide. I have also found the sheepshead have been growing a couple pounds when you fish the deeper water. For some reason the fish around the jetties and some of the shallow water holes have not been as big this year. I think the water still needs to warm up a couple degrees…
Final tally for the day…
12 big sheeps
2 legal gags
tons of snapper
lots of slot reds
Geat job guys!!
Brant Peacher
www.fishtheemeraldcoast.com
850-450-3878
My buddy Trevor and I loaded up the boat this morning on a mission for sheepshead. A quick stop at Hot Spots for some live shrimp and we were on the water by 8. At the pass, we looked at the depth finder the whole time. We found some rocks and ledges at 40ft, so we dropped down. Seconds later, Trevor is bent over!
We stay on this spot for a few hours. Ended up with 12 sheeps and a few cutoffs. Awesome day!
Chris Dunn
I had a great crew on Saturday. I guided Brittany King, Tony Coughlin and Dawna Fackrell on an afternoon Sheepshead trip. The winds were a stiff 20+ knots out of the South East and the temperatures were in the 50’s. We arrived at the North jettie to find several boats already there. After finding our spot and sinking the anchor we started deploying our live shrimp.
We were hooked up very quickly with Dawna landing our first keeper of the day. She was followed very quickly by Brittany who had a keeper of her own. The action stayed pretty steady for about an hour and a half with Tony getting in the mix to land a few as well. Shortly before calling our trip early due to increasing wave size caused by the stiff winds. Dawna hooked our biggest fish of the day. She boated a 4.6lb stud Sheepshead!
Total catch was 7 Sheepshead and one large stingray. We had a fun afternoon and if the winds would have cooperated we would have surely filled the cooler in no time!
This trip I guided Tom, his girlfriend, Kimberly and RJ. We basically repeated the pattern from the day before. The only difference in todays trip was we had to release 3 keeper gags! Now that’s heartbreaking! All fish were caught deep dropping on a bunch of bay numbers I have. The bite seemed to really turn on when the tide turned. They stayed hooked up all afternoon…We boated 10 big sheeps, 3 keeper gags, 3 redfish, 20 snapper, a big black drum, and a legal scamp! Rj got a 27″ and a 24″ red! Way to go! All fish were caught on live pinfish and shrimp. I had them rigged with 30lb Power Pro, 25lb floro leader, with a #2 Eagle Claw hook. Great job guys!
Weather is warming and I have seen a drastic change in the fishing over the last 3 days. The bite went from very poor to great in a matter of one day. The last 3 days we have caught 7 or 8 species of very good eating fish. Most all the fish in March are caught close to structure in deep water so make sure you bring your bottom machine. March can be one of the best times of year to fish Pensacola bay. The sheepshead move in, the Pompano bite picks up and lots of slot reds are being caught. The Fort Pickens and Fort Mcrea jetties are a great place to anchor up and have consistant action. It is much better to fish these areas mid week. If you try and go on the weekend then you will be fighting a bunch of boat traffic. However, if you can get a good spot off the end of one of the jetties chances are you will fill your coolers with tasty sheepshead, Pompano, and Black Snapper!
Another great way to target fish in March is ride the beaches. March brings the migration of Pompano, and Cobia along the panhandle. If you pick a sunny day and ride the first sandbar looking in all of the washouts, chances are very good that you will see a number of Pompano and Redfish. This is a very good way to target spring time fish! I rig my Cabo 30s with 10lb suffix braid for maximum casting distance. You want to be able to make the longest possible cast before the fish spots you. Once the fish spots the boat it is too late. I rig with either a 12 to 15lb flourocarbon leader when pompano fishing. Sometime they can be leader shy. If you are not familiar with them then stop by Hot Spots bait and tackle and pick you up a few Conors pompano jigs. I prefer pink myself…I would also suggest tipping your jig with a small sandflea. That way you will be certain the fish bites. This set up will be fine for a redfish as well! Last but not least….don’t forget to have a cobia jig handy. They migrate during the spring and you don’t want to miss an opportunity if you spot one. Good luck anglers….
Captain Brant Peacher
www.fishtheemeraldcoast.com
On this particular morning I got the pleasure of guiding Edwin and his son Jeffery. Our goal was to target monster redfish on shallow flats in Pensacola Bay. Right now the big bulls are in pairs spawning on these flats so it makes for a great sightfishing trip! The only issue we had this morning was rain and wind which makes it very tough to see a fish. After riding the banks for 30 minutes, I knew we were fighting a losing battle. No sunshine made the visiblity very poor. I decided it would be best to blind cast the dropoffs on the edge of the banks. I figured we might find a few stragglers somewhere. It did not take long before we were hooking up with 35 to 40 inch fish. The cool part about hooking a beast like that is we were only 10ft from the bank. After catching a few nice ones, the rain, wind, and cold became unbearable, so we called the trip off early and headed in.
These monster fish should be in this area for at least another month. What some people may not know is that some big bulls actually come up in 3 to 4ft of water to spawn on sandy bottoms. It is best to look for these fish on sand where you are finding a bunch of pot holes and drops offs right off the bank. In this particular area it is 15ft deep no more than 10 ft from the bank. I think a fish of that size feels much safer on a shallow flat when he knows he is only a few feet from very deep water. It is funny, but I have also found that these spawning fish will eat almost anything thrown at them. They are not picky at all…
Capt Brant Peacher
www.fishtheemeraldcoast.com
I had the pleasure of taking Denis, a return customer of mine, and some of his family and friends on a fishing trip yesterday. The weather was nice, still a little cold when the clouds were out, but getting better! The fish bit pretty well, it was hit and miss throughout the morning but in the early afternoon we got on them hot! Total for the day was 15 nice sheepsheads, 3 pompano, and 1 redfish.
Mitchell with a nice sheepshead
A group shot with a few of our fish
Dan caught this nice keeper gag grouper but the season is closed until next month so back he went.
Capt Matt Mcleod
www.hotspotcharters.com
www.hotspotstackle.com
matt@hotspotstackle.com
850-418-5333
