snook fishing

It’s been a chilly, windy start to the holiday season but the fish are chewing! Despite crazy cold fronts and heavy winds the fishing has been nothing short of incredible, with all the wicked weather offshore fishing has been pretty much out of the question but the inshore bite remains strong!

Most anglers can find a variety of species from snook, redfish, tripletail, black drum, pompano and more in and around the surf and inlets. These cool fronts really bunch the fish up and tend to slow down their metabolism. This typically makes fishing really good with smaller profile baits such as shrimp, fiddler crabs, sand fleas and a variety of small jigs such as the gulp shrimp. Those in search of larger species like snook and redfish, a free lined shrimp with a small pinch weight can be extremely effective especially fishing near any sort of structure with good water depth.

Many anglers get really excited about the pompano and sheepshead fishing that is found along the entire surf from new smryna and as far south as Sebastian. On the calmer days, try fishing a double hook rig with a 2-3 oz pyramid sinker. Most of the troughs are very close shore. The best approach is to set several rods varying different distances and or depths. The “go to” bait in these situations is a fresh sand flea tipped with a small chunk of fish bites soft plastic. Apply the chunk of artificial bait over your fresh sand flea or even peeled shrimp. This setup can produce some quality fish!

The most important factor this time of year when fishing along the beach is looking for clean water. It’s as easy as find clean water and find the fish! I wish everyone the best and hope you can all get out and enjoy some of this wonderful winter fishing!