Although I only managed to get out on the water twice this week, both trips were productive, yielding a good number of snook and trout, as well as a few jacks and smaller reds.

One notable observation was the drop in water temperature, which was down about 5 degrees from last week. Despite this change, there’s still an abundance of bait in the area, and species like snook, trout, reds, and jacks are actively feeding on them.

Interestingly, I’ve seen a wide range of bait sizes being targeted, from shrimp and glass minnows to larger mullet. In terms of lures, both 3″ and 5″ paddle tails worked equally well, and the topwater bite has been consistently good over the past couple of weeks.

Overall, it’s been an encouraging couple of trips, and I’m looking forward to seeing how the fishing continues to evolve in the coming weeks.

It’s been slow at the T-dock, but Snookman says snook and sheepshead are a possibility.

Good morning, Sebastian Inlet fishing folks. I hope you all had a great weekend. The weather was nice and the fishing was decent. With that said, here we go with this week’s installment.

The north side in the back was slow, but anglers were catching nice sheepshead on cut shrimp along the rocks. A few small snook and redfish were reported fishing live shrimp on the incoming tide, back by the trees. Redfish you still can’t keep, and the snook were too small, but still fun to catch. The north side beach, before it got rough and dirty, was producing black drum, whiting and pompano for those fishing sand fleas and shrimp. That was last week. Conditions calmed down and cleaned up during the weekend and the boats fishing the NE tip on the outgoing tide and the SE tip on the incoming have been doing pretty good on black drum, redfish and undersized snook, but a few keepers were caught according to my charter captains. All on live shrimp.

The snook action has been at the south jetty last week, and continued over the weekend. Plenty of undersized fish were caught, with a few keepers mixed in to keep it interesting. Live shrimp was the key bait of choice. The outgoing tide on the beachside was the area. Also, on the incoming tide, there were plenty of snook caught as well. Again, use live shrimp. There are plenty of fish, but most were under the 28 minimum to keep. Also, I saw fun-sized redfish in the mix, along with sheepshead, whiting and black margates and small bluefish at the tip on cut shrimp, outgoing tide. Along the beach on this side, the pompano were biting until the surf became roughed up and dirty. However, it should clean back up this week — it didn’t look too bad on Sunday. The water temperature has dropped back down to 65 over the weekend, but should warm up when the east winds return. On the ‘plus” side, it didn’t affect the bite this time!

It’s been slow around the T-dock and cleaning station, with only a few nice sheepshead and black drum caught. The snook bite has improved slightly, with nice fish caught at night and the wee hours of the morning. Flair jigs have been the lure of choice.

That’s all I have for this week — still holding steady from last week’s report. Hopefully the fishing will improve when the weather and water warm up. Have a great week. Get out and fish!

Hope everyone is doing well and had a chance to get out and fish this past week! The fishing has been steady, with plenty of black drum, whiting, a few pompano and palometas showing up. The southeast winds have dirtied the water and brought in a lot of miscellaneous weeds and ocean debris along the beaches. However, the fish don’t seem to mind too much.

The best baits have been shrimp pieces (make sure they are peeled) and sand fleas. Rig them up on a pompano rig with a chartreuse or orange float, and you’ll be golden. The fish have been biting well on the falling tides but have been hit or miss on the incoming tides. The water has started to warm up to the ideal range for pompano; it just needs to clear up a bit. Fortunately, the waves this week look to settle down.

On March 1st, we’ll be hosting a surf fishing challenge, so stay tuned! Be sure to follow us on Facebook, where we’ll announce the event details and prizes for the winners.

Have a great week, everyone—tight lines!

After a couple weeks of warmer temps and good fishing inshore and nearshore the winds increased and the temperatures dropped last week making it tougher inshore and too rough to fish off the beach. The pompano bite was good in the lagoon along with good trout and snook bite as well. We focused on deeper shorelines that had bait and were able to find good action with paddle tails and jerk baits rigged on 1/4 ounce jig heads. There was also some pompano in the inlet as well as plenty of jacks, some mackerel and bluefish.

With the forecast being similar this week looking for more of the same, but if we can get out on the beach. We can also get into more mackerel, some spinner sharks and black tips and look for some tarpon along the beach.

The bite has been on fire this past week with large schools of redfish and black drum eating artificials and live shrimp. Snook have been eating a jumbo live shrimp free lined too. The cooler weather has dropped the water temperature into the low to mid 60s, which is keeping the water extremely clear and making it easy to locate the fish. With consistent weather conditions over the next couple of weeks, the fishing should remain good to great.

I have days available in March and April if you’d like to call me at 386-295-5991 or go right to my website, FatFishGuide.com you can book your next great fishing adventure in the Mosquito Lagoon.

Fished Fairview Saturday morning, started across the lake from Grills near the dock with the red roof and worked to the right. Cold front had pushed the fish out to the first drop and I got a great start to the day. First 5 casts put 3 fish in the boat, 2.29lbs on the first cast, missed on the second cast, a dink on third, nothing on 4th and 1.88 on 5th cast. Caught 8 total, 3.14 biggest pictured and only 2 dinks. 5 best weighed 11.18lbs. Most were caught on a Yamamoto 7 inch Speed Senko in Gooseberry with the others on a Berkley maxscent General in Black and Blue flake with a blue tail. Fish were in the submerged vegetation and along the drop offs, up to 24 feet of water.

2 hours in a kayak under the 520 causeway. Windy and only managed some garbage fish and a couple small sheep using live shrimp.

So just when we thought that Spring had arrived here in Central Florida ole Winter had to make another appearance. We had a small front dip down over the weekend bringing wind, rain and cooler temperatures across Daytona Beach, New Smyrna Beach and Mosquito Lagoon. It kinda throw the fish for a little loop as they were starting to get settled into a spring time pattern. But, after figuring out that temperature and wind direction are changing they have got right back into the groove of things. Look for the red fish and trout throughout the sand holes and deeper sloughs of mosquito Lagoon and back waters of New Smyrna. The snook have been hanging in the deeper water in and around structure. We also have a large number of black drum working the shallows on the mud and sand bottom. The baits of choice have been shrimp, mullet and cut bait along with soft plastics and spoons. It looks as though we have another cold front moving in mid week so I believe this pattern will stay in place for a while.

Fishing in our area has been incredibly productive over the past week, with many species starting to move out of their winter hiding spots.

The recent influx of baitfish has really fired things up, with schools of large jacks feeding on mullet schools in shallow waters. Snook are also on the prowl, congregating around ambush points near bait schools.

In the deeper waters, trout are still holding strong along the mangrove drop-offs. I’ve also observed sheepshead feeding on barnacles on mangrove roots while out on the water.

My go-to lures have been 3″ and 5″ paddle tails, as well as the MirrOlure Little John, all rigged on 3/16 oz and 1/8 oz jigs. These setups have been producing consistent results.

With the fish starting to move and baitfish abundant, now’s a great time to get out on the water and capitalize on the action!

Early in the week we had some pretty good weather that allowed us to get off the beach and chase the tarpon and play with some Blacktip sharks. Topwater and live bait both worked on the sharks and we caught a few tarpon on live bait as the sharks were thick and hard to get the tarpon to eat. The inshore bite was pretty good with a few snook and plenty of trout, jacks, bluefish and a few pompano. Snook were eating live bait most of the time but we still managed a few on soft plastics but mostly smaller fish. Winds picked up later in the week and the bite got tougher as it does this time of the year with daily changes in weather conditions and wind direction.

This week the winds are high with a few fronts but the bait has been around pretty good and the rain will push more bait out of the creeks and into the lagoon which should help the bite when the temperatures stabilize.