Terry Lacoss
For the News-Leader
“Bottom fishing has been on fire recently,” said Capt. Allen Mills, skipper of the Wahoo II charter fishing boat. “I recently guided longtime friends and charter clients Mallory Smith, Thad Carter and Zach Terry to a big catch of saltwater bottom fish. Included was a seven-fish limit each of excellent eating black sea bass. Our best action came in water depths from 68-74 feet while fishing with fresh local squid.
“The highlight of our fishing trip included a nice cobia that managed to spit the hook right at the boat.”
Jack Healan, Greg Cook, Bill Fassbender and I recently navigated back into the local tidal estuaries and hooked into a big school of redfish weighing up to six pounds. In less than an hour’s fishing time, we had caught our limit, one redfish per person measuring at least 18 inches and not over 27 inches.
Some of the best action was fishing right under a fishy boat dock with a live shrimp barbed to a 1/4-ounce jig or onto a size-one kahle hook weighted with a buck-shot pinched onto the main line and 12 inches in front of the hook. Excellent red-fishing action was also had by drifting a barbed live shrimp under a popping float close to boat dock pilings.
Our game plan was to catch a few backwater species and then run offshore and fish deep for a variety of bottom game fish.
Sixty minutes later, we were barbing chunks of cigar minnows to 2/0 kahle hooks and dropping them down to the live, rocky reef below.
Fishing action was fantastic with red snapper heading the list. Red snapper weighing just over 10 pounds were fought up to the boat and released. Healan caught the largest and dreaded having to let his fresh seafood dinner go.
Currently red snapper are on the endangered species list by the South Atlantic Fishery. Last year, saltwater fishermen were able to fish one day for red snapper while keeping only one red snapper with no size limit. Cook sighted a keeper-sized cobia swimming just under the
surface, which quickly swam deep. Cook dropped a barbed cigar minnow to a mid-depth and was soon hooked up to more than likely the same cobia. Unfortunately, a large bull shark that had also been sighted earlier, ate Cook’s cobia and potential seafood dinner.
Fishermen are voicing that there currently is an over abundance of sharks that are not only attacking and eating hooked both troll-ing and bottom species of fish, but the over abundance of red snapper.
Fortunately, it appears to be a sustainable stock of black sea bass offshore of Northeast Florida. More than likely, black sea bass blend into the rocky reefs below and are hard to spot by sharks.
Delicious, hard-fighting black sea bass are plentiful at most offshore fish habits, weather permitting. Best setup includes a 7-foot, medium-heavy action spinning rod with a size 5,000 size spinning reel filled with 50-pound blue braided fishing line. A 4- to 6-ounce egg weight is then threaded onto the main line depending on the depth of water, drift or current. Next, attach a 2-foot length of 40-pound fluoro-carbon leader is attached to the main line using back-to-back uni knots. Finally, a 2/0 kahle hook is tied to the business end of the shock leader.
Today’s tip: Pinch a buck-shot weight onto the fishing line just in front of the leader fishing line connection. This will eliminate the need for a swivel. Fishermen can also adjust the length of the main weight from the hook by placing the buckshot up or down on the main line.
The best baits for black sea bass includes fresh local squid, fresh local shrimp or cut pieces of cigar minnows. Deep sea fishermen can also deep jig live minnows, which make excellent live baits with a series of small, feathered hooks.