Fort Pierce Mangrove Snapper

This angler proudly displays one of the many species of snappers he’s been catching at the Fort Pierce Inlet seawall and jetty. This legal length mutton snapper ate a live shrimp.

This is my last report for 2019 — and a lot has happened in my life over this past year. We sold a condo in Fort Pierce and bought an actual house there with enough land to store my fleet of boats. Our house and home of twenty years, located in Titusville, is up for sale and I’m currently dealing with the ramifications of setting up shop in a new location.

Even though the actual move went smoothly, it went slowly as well and we were able to venture out only a handful of times. By the time I was able to free myself from the responsibilities of unpacking and settling in, our weather pattern changed. The past couple of weeks have been rainy and relentlessly windy. I haven’t even tried to launch a boat or wet a line over the past two weeks.

Since relocating we’ve only experienced one poor outing as I scouted a favorite summer pattern location. The slowness of this particular trip certainly reminded me why it’s a not a winter pattern favorite. Happily, the other trips produced lots of fish and an impressive variety too. This factor is why we decided to move back to the tidal waters of the Indian River Lagoon!

I do have a current fishing report, though. Land based anglers are catching a decent number of fish. The Fort Pierce south jetty has been alive with anglers enjoying their holiday time off. Our winter pattern is in full effect and the active sheepshead bite certainly proves the point. Most are small though many are well over the minimum length limit.

Along with the convict fish, the jetty anglers are catching a mix of snappers including several legal muttons, plenty of jacks, a handful of pompano, and some lookdowns too. Dock and seawall fishers are doing extremely well with sand perch (mojarra) and mangrove snapper. Live shrimp and cut shrimp are yielding the best results. If the current/tides are flowing hard, a live shrimp on a jighead is producing “some of everything” from the list above.

I’m truly looking forward to year 2020 and hope you’ll continue following my antics throughout the coming year. Happy New Year all!