The surf zone is a wild arena. Completely different environments span the Northeast to the Carolinas all the way to Florida. Texas and California are distinct too. But anglers who prowl the beaches know some surf rigs can be ubiquitously applied. Still, the many different options available might confuse those who don’t understand their applications. And surf spots in different states sometimes have different names for the same rigs. As a diehard New Jersey surf caster, I want to help you pick the best rigs for your favorite species. The hi-lo rig, pill float rig, fishfinder rig, chunk rig, and mullet rig are some my favorites for stripers, redfish and pompano, even sharks.

The Hi-Lo Surf Rig

Quick Summary: Why have one hook when you can have two? Joking aside, there’s more to the logic of a hi-lo rig (dropper loop rig) than just having another hook. The hi-lo rig, sometimes spelled high-low rig, is meant to cover the waters just off the sea floor, anywhere bottom fish are feeding. Even one foot can make a difference to get bites when targeting true bottom feeders or to convince wary fish to swim up and eat a bait. Bait with worms, clams, shrimp, crabs or small chunk baits. (You can also use the rig when fishing bridges or piers — just space out the hooks accordingly.)

Design: Use a 75-pound barrel swivel and 30-inch section of leader. Tie the two dropper loops 16 inches apart in the leader. Pick appropriate size hooks scaled to the fish species you’re targeting, then thread the hooks on to the dropper loops. Tie a loop knot to the opposite end of the leader that you tied the swivel. A loop knot allows you to easily attach and remove a weight for different conditions. In the surf, pyramid sinkers work the best to hold bottom.

Species: Surf stripers, snapper, grouper, black sea bass, rockfish, tautog

The Fishfinder Slide Rig

Quick Summary: The fishfinder rig is meant to allow feeding fish to pick up a natural bait without feeling any unnatural resistance. The lack of tension helps prevent a gamefish from spitting out the offering. Try this setup when using live baits such as bunker (menhaden), mullet, eels, pilchards, sandworms or bloodworms. You can also use chunk baits or fresh clams as well. Besides the surf, good spots to use fishfinder rigs include inlets or creeks when the tide is running. Anglers should free-spool the line and allow a fish to take it unhindered in the current for a natural presentation.

Design: Utilize a fishfinder slide with sinker clip to attach a pyramid or bank-style sinker, or you can substitute an egg sinker for the slide clip. I prefer to use a 75-pound barrel swivel to prevent the sliding weight from reaching the hook. To the swivel, tie on 20 to 30 inches of leader and a snelled hook.

Species: Fluke, southern flounder, striped Bass, red drum, cobia, sheepshead

The Pill Float Rig

Quick Summary: Use this rig to keep the baits floating off the bottom to prevent crabs from stealing your baits. Sandfleas, worm bits and clam bits are great natural baits. Artificial offerings such as Fishbites, Fishgum and Gulp Saltwater Surf Bytes work too. Targets are generally smaller fish species up to 4 pounds. Or use the rig to procure live baits such as grunts and pinfish for the livewell. One other spot this rig excels: fun fishing along bridges and piers.

Design: A hi-lo rig design, except with small Styrofoam pill shaped floats in front of the size number 4 to 8 bait-holder hooks.

Species: Pompano, whiting (northern kingfish), white perch, grunts, pinfish

The Chunk Rig

Quick Summary: Tie on the chunk rig when targeting larger gamefish and you want to throw big baits. Use chunk baits such as menhaden, bluefish, cut mullet, pinfish, grunts or herring. A long leader allows bigger fish to pick up the bait and swim off. Then, an angler can and should reel tight for an effective hook-set. This is a great all-around rig when casting from the shoreline targeting different species. Just about everything eats chunk baits, except maybe those few crab-crunchers.

Design: Tie on a three-way swivel, with a sinker clip attached to one eye to handle a pyramid weight. The other eye receives a 30-inch piece of 40- to 80-pound mono leader. A snelled circle hook, scaled accordingly from 5/0 to 12/0, ensures solid hook sets.

Species: Sharks, striped bass, bluefish, drum, snook

The Mullet Rig

Quick Summary: Specifically designed to throw fresh or frozen mullet, this rig allows the whole bait to be fished in a natural manner. The mullet floats just above the sandy seafloor in an enticing display to attract feeding gamefish. Also, the float keeps your bait off bottom where crabs can pick it apart.

Design: For this rig, I use an oval Styrofoam float built-in with a 4-inch length of wire, ending with a dual-barb hook. To bait this rig, remove the hook first. Thread the mullet on the wire from the mouth down through the body out the anal vent. Then, reattach the hook back to the metal leader. Make sure one barb is pierced into the side of the tail. Tie your floating mullet to a length of leader that connects to a three-way swivel. Connect your swivel to the main line. The third leg gets a sinker clip and weight.

Species: Striped Bass, bluefish, red drum, sharks

The post Top Bait Rigs for Surf Fishing appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

Most fishermen can carve reasonably flat pieces of meat from bones, but pro captains and guides know tricks that cut time while also paring flesh to the bone for a variety of species. I’ve asked several professional guides and captains from New England to the Bahamas for their filleting tips.

Fishing Fillet Knives

Most pros have at least two fishing knives — one for filleting and one for skinning. A straight blade around seven inches long with just a bit of flex will typically provide the best control of a fillet-knife tip as one navigates through and around skin, flesh and bone. For skinning, on the other hand, long, flexible knives do the job better. Nine inches seems about right. Expensive isn’t necessarily better, but a cheap knife won’t have a blade that’s both flexible and hard enough to hold its edge. ­Forschner and Dexter Russell were recommended by several pros I interviewed.

The One-Cut Fillet

Fish that aren’t very tall from dorsal to belly — like sea bass and yellowtail and vermilion snapper — can be filleted with just one pass. “I make an angled cut from the top to the belly just past its pectoral fin, then I turn the knife and run it right along the fish’s spine,” says Capt. Carl Griffin, of Reel Deal Charters in Charleston, South Carolina. The blade penetrates both belly and dorsal simultaneously, all the way to the tail, and the fillet comes off in one piece. Lay the fillet skin-side down to cut ribs out, and check the fillet along the spine up near the head for remnant bones.

This works well on small mackerel too. “I’ll run the knife through the whole fish in one pass on fish up to about 20 pounds,” says Capt. Jamie Ralph, a freelance captain in Boynton Beach, Florida. A few pieces of backbone stay in the entire length of the fillet, but Ralph cuts these out along with the blood line — the dark meat surrounding the spine, particularly in mackerel, tuna and dolphin.

Top-to-Bottom Fish Fillet

Larger fish require a half-dozen knife cuts, always working from the dorsal downward. Griffin starts with an angled cut from the head to belly, then he makes “a long cut from the head all the way down the back, just barely breaking the skin.” In the next pass, Griffin says, “I cut along the bones down to the spine, then I work up and over the spine. You have to hold the top half of the fillet up away from the bone to get a good fillet on the bottom of the fish.” Griffin’s fifth cut goes from backbone down to — but not through — the rib cage. As his knife moves toward the tail, the tip comes through the skin from anus to tail. Griffin then uses a heavy serrated knife to cut through the ribs, working from anus up toward the head.

Ribs In or Out?

Instead of cutting through the ribs, many pros cut them out while removing the fillet. “Run your knife along the rib bones,” says Capt. Brian Garris, an inshore guide. “Just don’t put so much pressure on the knife that you break those bones.” This takes some practice on delicate fish like seatrout, so check the fillet and trim out any missed bones.

Striped bass have a pronounced rib cage. “The knife goes along the ribs easily at first, but it gets hard at the steep angle of the rib cage,” says Patrick Wood, of Hindsight Sport Fishing in Cape Cod, Massachusetts. “I’ll hold the fish down with the knife blade and then rip the rest of the meat off the ribs.”

How to Skin a Fish

A ragged fillet might not be noticed at dinnertime, but a bit of skin left on the meat stands out. If skinning is a problem, try these tips.

“Use a long fillet knife with a flexible blade,” says Capt. Justin Hubbard, who works at Haddrell’s Point Tackle in Charleston, South Carolina. “Bend that knife so the point of the blade and the heel of the blade are running right on the table,” he says. “It will lie flat right along the skin.”

On fish with thick skin, angle the blade down into the skin just a bit. On fish with thin skin, break the job up. “On mackerel, you have to remove the blood line anyway,” Griffin says, so he cuts each fillet down its length into two lengthwise halves, and then skins each. “It’s a lot easier to skin just half a fillet.”

Most pros take the skin off in one or two smooth strokes, but this takes practice. Until then, skin evenly across the fillet, dorsal to belly, a few inches at a time. With the fillet skin-side down on the table, start at the tail, leaving just a bit of meat at the tip of the tail to hold on to. (If you muck it up, try again from the corner near the head.)

“Get a good hold on the skin,” Garris says. “As you move the knife along, keep following with your fingers up close behind the blade so you’ve always got even pressure between the blade and the skin.” Garris says in doing this, you’re also holding the portion of the fillet you’ve already skinned up out of the way.

Peel or Cut to Skin?

Many people cut barely through dolphin skin all the way around the fillet, and then pull the skin off before filleting the fish. A glove or pliers helps. This works for mackerel, tuna and other small-scaled species as well, but pros shy away from this trick.

Pulling the skin off leaves fibers of flesh on the skin and somehow also changes the taste of the fish, according to Capt. Lige Lawrence on the Island Hooker in Fort Lauderdale. He’ll pull the skin off small dolphin, but he cuts larger fish from their skin. Lawrence divides his fillets in half or thirds while skinning. “Cut about an eighth of an inch above the skin,” Lawrence says. “You can feel it. The knife cut gets tougher when you get close to the skin.”

No-Knife Tuna Fillet

Capt. Brett Wilson cuts large tuna down the length of the fish along the lateral line. “As long as it’s good and cold,” he says, “you can reach in and fillet it — take the meat right off the bone — with your hand.” To get tuna that cold, he packs ice in and around gutted fish and then adds seawater to make a brine.

While variations to these tips are numerous, there are a few universal recommendations. Keep knives sharp — there are plenty of tools to help. Go slowly — speed comes only with ­repetition. And probably most ­important, pay attention to pros cleaning fish and don’t hesitate to ask questions. Most experts will even guide you through a fillet job — but only with your fish!

How to Fillet a Mahi

The post How to Fillet Fish Like a Pro appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

Armed with the knowledge that scientists who dissect large South Florida bonefish report gulf toadfish (Opsanus beta) in their bellies, my intention was to uncover a panacean soft bait to target flighty bonefish. Heck, there must be a reason certain bonefish flies like Harry Spears’ Tasty Toad, Pat Dorsey’s Kwan Fly, and the Gummy Minnow imitate a toadfish, goby, and glass minnow.

But after speaking with established Florida Keys captains such as Rich Smith, of Marathon, and Dave Atkinson, of Islamorada, I’ve learned just how unpredictable and scarce bonefish can become at times. When limited numbers leave them with narrow opportunities for customers — live shrimp, small crabs and flies offer the best presentation, so they stay with what’s habitually successful. “You really have to take advantage of the ­opportunities you get,” says Atkinson.

Different fish stories persist in South Florida of bonefish attacking bait schools intended for different species, but none ignite any degree of confidence. Still, options do exist for spin anglers who want to trick bonefish without relying on live baits like shrimp and crabs.

The Best Bonefish Jig

Most captains I spoke with agreed that the simplest lure to tempt a bonefish is the skimmer jig. Sometimes called a bonefish jig or flats jig, it’s flat with a tip shaped like a diamond or a circle. The hook and jig eye always point toward the surface to deter snags with grassy or rocky bottom where bonefish live. The hook is dressed with bucktail, fly or synthetic material to mimic shrimp and crabs. Different than traditional boxing-glove jig heads, the slender skimmer wobbles in the water and falls at a slower rate.

“Lightly twitch the rod so the jig hops off the bottom like a shrimp,” says Capt. Mo Estevez, who fishes South Florida’s Biscayne Bay regularly. “With a pure jig — which has no smell — you’re appealing to bonefishes’ keen eyesight. The jig’s productivity is dependent on the ability and skill of the angler. It’s tough to get the right action.”

Many captains tip the jig with fresh shrimp to appeal to a bonefish’s olfactory senses, but that’s no longer a true artificial. Instead, use artificial-shrimp scent (like Berkley Gulp! Alive, Pro-Cure or Carolina Lunker Sauce) on your jigs.

Color combos are wide ranging for the jigs, but browns, oranges, whites and pinks are top picks. In general, choose colors that mimic the same color as the bottom substrate or the colors of the local crustaceous fauna. In South Florida, common prey such as xanthid (mud) crabs , portunid (swimming) crabs, alpheid (pistol) shrimp and penaeid (Atlantic white) shrimp all mimic popular jig colors. Pick ⅛-, ¹⁄₁₆- or ³⁄₁₆-ounce jigs based on how shallow the flat is.

“Skimmer jigs work for anglers who don’t fly-fish,” says Estevez. “With the higher tide, bonefish feel and act safer with more water over their back. Still, I prefer low water on an incoming tide to spot them as they ‘pop’ onto the flats from deeper water.”

Popular jig brands include Hookup Lures Weedless Bucktails or Capt. Harry’s Flats Jigs, but many lure makers offer their own patterns.

Playing the Bonefish Numbers Game

Beyond South Florida, areas such as the Bahamas, Yucatan Mexico, Los Roques, Venezuela and Belize can offer incredible numbers of bonefish. In areas of abundance, anglers have the opportunity to try different presentations.

The bonefish of Los Roques eat from a buffet of glass minnows in the waters around the island, shadowing pelicans that dive on the bait. But the Venezuelan bones are a unique and exotic outlier; shrimp, crabs and sea worms still reign supreme for bonefish in most parts of the world. Consider these two techniques when the bonefish are ready and willing or in large groups mudding.

A Bone to Pick

1. Cast Berkley Gulp! Shrimp

“I have success with Berkley Gulp! Shrimp whenever I can’t find fresh shrimp,” says Capt. Jody Albury, of Marsh Harbour, Bahamas. He casts the artificial shrimp the same way he would a natural one. “Fishing the Marls, I use 10-pound SpiderWire braid, a light fluorocarbon leader and an Eagle Claw Baitholder hook, size 1/0.”

Besides Berkley Gulp!, South Florida anglers are having increased success with Savage Gear 3D Manic Shrimp and Vudu Shrimp lures. It’s a stealth presentation that requires the angler to set up on a flat where the bonefish are likely to flood onto — it’s not necessarily sight fishing. Anglers must make plenty of casts to where the deeper water meets the flat.

2. Cast a Fly With a Split Shot

A second method Albury mentions sprung from necessity — or possibly frustration — when fishing the extremely shallow flats that straddle the western side of Great Abaco. The Marls are a mix of mangrove, keys, limestone and bright-white sand.

“If the fish are being picky, I’ll have my spin anglers cast a fly with a split shot a couple of inches above the fly,” he says. “My favorite bonefish flies are the EP Spawning Shrimp and Veverka’s Mantis Shrimp, both in size 4.” Some might consider the technique cross-pollinating fishing styles, but I’d counter it’s a clever move to diversify your fishing arsenal for a fickle species.

Targeting Bonefish in Deepwater Harbors

Sight-fishing takes a back seat to other tactics when bonefish vacate the flats during the heat of the summer or the chilling temps of winter. Bonefish handle low oxygen levels that accompany hot water in coastal, tropical habitats by inhaling air into a lunglike air bladder. Still, larger bones retreat to deeper waters during the summer. In this warm-water scenario, ­blind-casting artificials pays dividends. The trick is to find deeper water near productive flats with current.

Regarding the Finger Channels south of Key Biscayne, says Estevez: “If it’s low tide, or in the cold of winter or dead of summer, head to the Finger Channels and bounce pompano jigs on the bottom. Bonefish head for the deeper channels, and you’re also likely to catch permit, mutton snapper and juvenile African pompano.”

Try pompano jigs or an undersize bucktail jig crafted mostly with a chrome jig head, short-shank hook and nylon skirt. The skirts are often cut short, just past the bend in the hook. Bomber’s Nylure Pompano jig is a good example of this style of jig. Other pompano jigs, like Doc’s Goofy Jig, are shaped kind of wacky. The Goofy jig is a long-shanked hook set inside a banana-shaped lead. Many times, the jig is dressed with a secondary hook hidden inside a skirt. This popular jig catches bonefish over sandy bottoms. Next time the fresh bait’s not available, tie on a jig with confidence.

The post Catch Bonefish with Lures appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

Anglers targeting big kingfish and Spanish mackerel by slow-trolling live baits use specialized techniques to entice wary fish to strike. One popular and proven tactic involves presenting two live baits on a single terminal rig, which creates a larger profile and more action. These double-pogy rigs can be tied in two basic designs. And while the pogy, or menhaden, is commonly used, this system works well with a variety of other baitfish. Both rig designs use extra-strong hooks and swivels, and employ haywire twists to make connections between lengths of single-strand wire. Skirts or colored beads can be added for color and flash.

King Mackerel Double Pogy Rig

Here’s the list of the materials needed:

• American Fishing Wire pre-cut lengths of camo brown 58-pound-test (12-inch) and 38-pound-test (36-inch)
• VMC 4X strong treble hooks, black nickel, size 4
• Owner Flyliner live-bait hooks, black chrome, size 1/0
• Spro Power Swivel, (single barrel swivel), size 7
• Spro Power Swivel Combo (three-way swivel), size 5
• Skirts or colored beads if desired. I like chartreuse and mylar.
• DuBro E/Z Twist tool for making haywire twist

This rig is built like a single-bait, two-hook rig but you add a second treble hook. Easy to build and tougher to tangle, the three-hook rig can also be used with small Spanish mackerel, large blue runners, ladyfish or ribbonfish — if you run short of terminal rigs built specifically for those baits.

STEP 1: Haywire-twist a treble hook onto each end of a 12-inch section of 58-pound-test wire. Leave approximately 6 inches of wire between the hooks.

STEP 2: Connect another 12-inch length of 58-pound-test wire to the eye of one of those treble hooks and finish the opposite end of the wire with a live-bait hook — again leaving about 6 inches between the hooks.

STEP 3: Haywire-twist one end of a 36-inch length of 38-pound-test wire to the live-bait hook and finish the opposite end with a single barrel swivel.

STEP 4: Below, a finished rig before adding live baits. But now it’s time to fish! Attach one bait to the live-bait hook by passing the point through the nostrils. Attach the second bait to the middle treble hook by passing a point of the treble through the nostrils. The last treble swings freely.

The Four-Hook Kingfish Rig

This rig is a combination of two single-bait rigs attached to the mainline with a three-way swivel. The four-hook rig allows each bait more freedom of movement, somewhat eliminating a tiring tug-of-war between baitfish, but it does so at an increased risk of tangling.

Haywire-twist a treble hook and a live-bait hook onto a 12-inch section of 58-pound-test wire, leaving approximately 6 inches between the hooks. Connect one end of a 36-inch length of 38-pound-test wire to the live-bait hook and the opposite end to one eye of a three-way swivel. Repeat this process with another treble and live-bait hook, but this time, remove 6 inches of the 36-inch length of wire before connecting it to the second eye of the three-way swivel.

Attach baits to the two live-bait hooks by passing the points through their nostrils. Attach the trebles to the bait by passing one point through the skin just behind the dorsal fin. If the treble hooks swing freely, that increases the chances of tangling when the two baits swim together.

Although I always try to pick baits of equal size and friskiness, it’s common for one baitfish to tire before the other, rendering the rig less effective and making it necessary to change out baits more often. However, this extra effort pays off when a smoker king skyrockets behind your boat with your handmade double-pogy rig in its mouth.

The post The Best Kingfish Live-Bait Rig appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

Three anglers were standing in neck-deep water off a beach on the Florida panhandle, being circled by a 12-foot shark—the kind of shark that makes its living attacking swordfish, tuna, and other sharks. It was the next-to-last moment in a beach-fishing adventure none of them will forget, and it ended safely for all of them, including the shark.

On November 12, Travis Lucas and friends Joshua Smith and Ben Brandner caught and released a very large shortfin mako shark from the beach. It’s exceedingly rare to catch a mako from shore; they prefer deep water and the larger prey that live there. This was the first confirmed shore-caught mako at Cape San Blas, about an hour east of Panama City. The shark was released per the rules; harvesting Atlantic mako sharks has been prohibited since 2022 due to overfishing.

Lucas, Smith, and Brandner never expected to catch a mako, let alone one that’s about as big as they get. “We usually just target big species, like bull sharks,” Lucas recalled. A week earlier, they had caught a 12-foot dusky shark and a 13-foot great hammerhead.

The Hometown Sharkers Score Big

The group, “Hometown Sharkers” on their social media, specialize in overnight beach outings.
Lucas was set up with an Okuma Makaira 130 reel spooled with 200-pound Reaction Tackle braid, a 300-pound mono top shot, and a homemade 800-pound leader on a 7-foot Rainshadow rod. The 24/0 circle hook was baited with a chunk of a blacktip shark caught earlier in the day.

Lucas had dropped the bait from a kayak about 1,000 yards offshore at sunset and paddled back to camp. During the evening, “we ended up catching a smaller bull shark on another rod,” he said. After that, it was a calm, cool night on a quiet beach—until it wasn’t.

“We had actually dozed off,” Lucas said. “I woke up to the 130 screaming.” He got into his harness and immediately knew the fish was heavy, perhaps a tiger shark. “It started pulling pretty significant drag pretty effortlessly,” he said.

Ten minutes in, the fish “woke up” and began leaping in the moonlight, “pretty much back-to-back for three or four minutes in one position, and then again in the next,” Lucas said. Eventually, the acrobatics ended. The fish ran toward shore a couple of times, which made life easier for Lucas, and the fight was over in 35 minutes.

As the fish neared the beach, the anglers still didn’t know what they had caught. Maybe a hammerhead, they thought. When it reached the wash, they thought it may have been a great white. When they finally got a light on it, “there was a lot of screaming,” Lucas recalled.

Team Release

“Releasing that fish was one of the most memorable situations I’ve had,” he said. “We realized it was a mako. Josh runs out with the tail rope. I come out with bolt cutters and the hook remover. We get out there, assess the situation, get it unhooked, get the leader off of it. It was about 49 degrees, it was cold.”

Lucas’s wife, Flower, and the other guys’ girlfriends watched and held flashlights from the beach. The group began moving the mako to deeper water to ease its release. “So it’s pitch black outside. We get out past the sandbar, so we know she can swim off. She swims out 10 or 15 feet and comes back at us. She made three full circles around us before thrashing at the surface and then swimming off. It was definitely nerve-wracking.”

The group saw for themselves why makos are sometimes confused with, blue sharks. “They are in every sense of the word ‘blue sharks’,” Lucas said. “When the light hits them they’ll go from deep purple to blue, and it’s a color you’d never expect to see from an animal. It almost seems like it’s a holographic. They’re pretty wild looking. It’s definitely a once in a lifetime fish.”

The post Massive Mako Caught on Florida Beach appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

Many years ago, Kona skipper George Parker made ­headlines around the world when he caught the first certified, world-record grander Pacific blue marlin. Since that 1,002-pound giant in November 1954, Hawaii’s lee eddies have churned up a stream of 1,000-pound blues that continues today. Kona waters usually average two or three granders per year, along with more Pacific blue marlin IGFA records than any other sport-fishing hot spot. That parade of records continues. In March 2013, Alex Nuttall boated a 958-pound blue marlin with Capt. Chip Van Mols on the Kona charter boat Monkey Biz II to claim the IGFA women’s 130-pound-class record.

Kona’s consistent billfish success sparked a worldwide revolution in big-game fishing because these big fish were caught on lures pioneered and developed in Hawaii waters. Meanwhile, big-game fishermen elsewhere had been saying you could catch billfish only with bait. Even those doubters caught the Kona wave and started catching marlin on Kona-style lures. Kona is also the perfect starting point for novices who have never caught a fish in their lives. It happens every day, 365 days a year. Newcomers are well served by a well-maintained fleet of top-of-the-line boats and expert captains.

Plus, Kona’s big fish hunt in deep, calm waters near shore. The 100-fathom line is a 10-minute run from Kona’s two main fishing fleets at Honokohau Harbor and Keauhou Bay. What’s more, the biggest fish of any week is usually a marlin in the 500- to 900-pound range caught by a complete newcomer on a four- or six-hour trip. On any day of the year, a visitor can find a suitable charter and hope to catch one or more of Hawaii’s mighty four: billfish, ahi (yellowfin tuna), mahimahi (dolphinfish) and ono (wahoo).

Billfish of Every Kind

Blue marlin, black marlin, striped marlin, sailfish, shortbill spearfish and broadbill swordfish — Kona’s waters are home to every billfish found in the Pacific. But each has a different story, and you should know those stories when you make plans.

Big blues are the billfish that pay the bills in Kona. Blues of all sizes are here year-round, but they are usually most common during the summer tournament season, from June through early September. Mid-Pacific currents can supply a fresh run at any time, however. For example, sometimes April surprises offshore trollers with fish heavier than 500 pounds on every day of the lunar cycle. Catches like these show that the lunar cycle has little, if any, influence on billfishing in Kona (unlike the effect different phases might have in other fishing areas).

Kona granders have also been landed in January, March and July. March, which might otherwise be considered the offseason elsewhere, has turned up more of Kona’s historic granders than any other month, and that includes the 1,649-pound Kona all-time record in 1984. The 1,376‑pound IGFA record for 130-pound class was caught in May 1982. Indeed, granders have been caught in Kona waters every month of the year. Licensed commercial fishermen are allowed to sell blue marlin in Hawaii, but professional skippers prefer tag-and-release for clients who want to let vital fish go. In any given week, more of Kona’s blues are tagged than kept. Visitors should make their wishes known when setting up a charter.

Hawaii’s Striped Marlin

Striped marlin cruise through Kona water’s year-round, but the big run extends from December through March. The Hawaii state record, 212 pounds, turned up here at the end of March 2011. That’s big for a north Pacific stripe, which is noteworthy because South Pacific stripers max out at more than double the weight of their northern cousins. Striped marlin are most attracted to Kona when winter waters cool down into the mid-70s. During those “chilly” times, the luckiest trollers might get up to a dozen striped marlin bites, and hook about a third of them.

Those same striped marlin ­conditions also attract shortbill spearfish of world-record size. Kona’s frisky shortbills ­presently hold 16 IGFA marks for tackle as light as 4-pound-class, and even on fly gear. Record-seekers troll hookless teasers to draw a spearfish within range, and then present a lure, fly or bait on the most sporting gear available. For most visitors, however, the spearfish is a surprise catch when trolling for blues and stripes.

For black marlin, Kona is outside the normal migration range. The entire Kona fleet sees only a handful each year, and these are much smaller than the giants of the Great Barrier Reef far to the south. Old-timers will remind you that the state record weighed 1,205 pounds, but that once-in-a-generation fish was caught in 1980.

Broadbills are the secret sensations for fishermen who know when, where and how to catch them. Most of Kona’s rod-and-reel swordies are caught at night during ika-shibi (traditional hand line) trips that target tuna. With its giant staring eyes, the broadbill is readily attracted to lights at night and to the squid schools that gather in the glow. The state record 503-pounder took the bait in June 2006 at the start of what are usually the three best swordfish months. Only a few boats cater to the night-fishing trade.

Hawaii Tuna Fuel Jet Revolution

More than fifty years ago, Hawaii troller Henry Nishikawa ignited the jet revolution when he caught a world-record ahi on a metal-headed lure drilled through and through with holes. His 269-pound yellowfin didn’t last long in the record books after anglers in the eastern Pacific discovered a tribe of bigger tuna off Mexico. Yet the IGFA record book is still overwhelmingly Kona on the ladies’ side: Kona catches made by women hold the 16-, 20-, 30- and 50-pound-class marks.

Though Kona waters attract ­resident schools of yellowfin year‑round, ahi are most abundant in late spring and throughout summer. As schools migrate west to east through the islands, the big runs reach Kauai first by Mother’s Day in May and Kona by Father’s Day in June. When the action is wide open, lucky boats can catch as many as 10 a day, all in the 100- to 220-pound range, by trolling or live-baiting with aku (skipjack tuna) or opelu (mackerel scad). During the rest of the year, ahi specialists target them with green-stick gear, and continue to catch a few each trip.

Hawaii’s state record ahi (a July catch) of 325 pounds is unusually large for central Pacific yellowfin tuna. Kona’s biggest ahi each year normally hits 250 pounds (258.5 in 2013). The state record bigeye (277 pounds in July 2013) and the biggest albacore (89.2 pounds in April 2011) both were caught on the Big Island’s windward (eastern) coast. The albacore weighed more than any on the IGFA record list but did not qualify for world-record status because it was caught on commercial-fishing gear. Kona ­fishermen regularly catch albies (tombo ahi) in the 60s and 70s on sport fishing tackle.

Mahimahi, Hawaii’s Gift to the World

Almost 70 years ago, Hawaii Big Game Fishing Club official George Perry set the 130-pound-class IGFA world record for dolphinfish with a 72.5‑pounder. That record didn’t last long, but the name “mahimahi” is Hawaii’s gift to the world, because it replaces the confusing name “dolphin” on restaurant menus. Though Hawaii has no current IGFA mahimahi records, the state-record 82-pounder confirms the potential. That record fish was a September Kona catch, but mahimahi are available any time the current drags a “floater” within trolling distance.

Mahimahi live up to their name (it means “very strong”), and the brightly colored, agile acrobats do their muscular tricks in Kona waters year-round. Occasionally huge schools gather around flotsam and jetsam for a wide-open bite that can go on for days. Then, skippers gear down to match the catch with sporting 20- and 30-pound-class rods. Unless a Kona skipper finds a floater, mahi are incidental catches on marlin and tuna trips.

By the way, the mahimahi record aside, Perry went on to catch the largest blue marlin in each of the first two Hawaiian International Billfish Tournaments (HIBT). The HIBT became an annual Kona fishing feature in 1959 and soon inspired dozens of other Kona tournaments. During the most popular tournament months of June, July and August, events compete with each other every week

Ono Blitzes, Summer Phenomenon

A Guide to Big Fish off the Big Island

Ninety years ago, a mysterious fellow known only as “J.B. Stickney” caught a 124.75-pound wahoo in Hawaii waters to set the world record. That was five years before the IGFA was founded, a time when records were compiled by Van Campen Heilner of Field & Stream and Francesca R. La Monte of the American Museum of Natural history. Ono — what wahoo are called in Hawaii — average 30 to 40 pounds, which makes J.B.’s catch even more extraordinary.

Big ones do show up now and then — state-record-holders Tom Brandt and Sky Mullins surprised their 133.2‑pound ono off the windward coast of the Big Island in December 2000. The major ono run reaches the Big Island in May of each year and hangs around into early September. Some ono are caught year-round, with early morning being your best chance. Kona skippers typically troll the 40-fathom line at the start of each trip to pick up any ono that might be harassing the nearshore bait schools.

To ward off the ono’s sharp teeth, skippers rig their special ono lures with single-strand stainless leaders. Ono slash at heavy-headed subsurface lures like weighted jets and lead-head feathers. On a typical trip specifically for ono, a successful boat might catch three or four fish. In years when ono blitz the summer currents, boats are known to hook as many as 40 on a single trip.

Other fishing areas might see the diversity of big-game fish that Kona has, but few have them in the sizes regularly seen here. In Kona, your next strike could come on any day of the year, in any phase of the moon, at any turn of the tide, on routinely comfortable seas, and be one of the Pacific’s biggest and most exciting game fish.

Shore Fishing off the Big Island

The post Kona Hawaii Offshore Fishing appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

When anglers think of pursuing saltwater fishing in Alaska, they’re usually inundated with dreams of wrestling a barn-door halibut — which sometimes get so big that anglers might use a .410 to dispatch the large behemoths. But that’s not the only species the cold waters of Northern California all the way to the Gulf of Alaska can provide.

Often thought of as the “younger brother” to targeting halibut in the Pacific Northwest (PNW), the rockfish offers an engaging, high-success-rate option for anglers looking to round out a trip. Also, consider the distressed halibut populations and increased limits anglers have seen in Alaska. If other fish species aren’t available to target, that could really hamper the legendary lodge trips Alaska is so famous for.

From deep-water holes along underwater ridges to the rocky reefs along the coast, rockfish offer a diverse and exciting fishing experience for anglers who target them. We spoke with experts in the field to learn more about the top five species of rockfish you’ll likely encounter in these waters — along with habitat, tackle and techniques for catching them.

Top Rockfish Species to Catch

We caught up with biologists and captains in the region to talk about the top species to catch (there’s more than 34 in Alaska alone). We classified them into two categories — “pelagic” and “non-pelagic.”

Pelagic Rockfish Species

These species tend to dwell off the bottom, congregating around rock pinnacles like walls, ridges, and even in kelp forests near rocky bottoms, but generally higher in the water column. They’re targeted with smaller jigs for the most part, along with spinners and flies on occasion.

Black Rockfish

Agreed upon by all our experts as easily the most-targeted and cooperative rockfish species, these fish school big time around rocky structure (as the name suggests). They are incredibly eager to bite once you find a school. We caught up with Cap. Brent Foster of Brookings Fishing Charters in Oregon. Foster specializes in lingcod and rockfish charters off the Oregon coast, and boasts that 80% of trips are black rockfish, with some really big ones.

“It’s not uncommon to have a 4- or 5-pound black on every trip.” That’s a trophy size fish, and great fun on the light tackle spinning gear. Brent fishes some of the smaller reefs off the lighthouse area of Oregon, often in less than 100 feet of water.

“We do a lot of light tackle here, not running big sticks like other guys do since we’re fishing in 100 feet of water or less with spinning rods and braided line,” Foster said. “Flutter Jigs and smaller paddle tail swimbaits up to 4 ounces excel; sometimes we have to go a bit heavier due to drift.”

Quillback Rockfish

Known for their distinctive spiky dorsal fins, quillbacks are another common pelagic rockfish that grow to good size, making them a favorite among anglers. While available farther north in Alaska, the quillback are a subject of controversy as they’ve been added to the list of banned harvest fish in Oregon. (Other species on the no-take list include copper and China rockfish.) As always, anglers should check limits and regulations of species when fishing in state or federal waters.

What are Non-Pelagic Rockfish?

These rockfish are found most often on or near the bottom and tend to prefer rocky bottoms (hence the name “rockfish”). More often than not, they’re hooked as bycatch when jigging or bait fishing for halibut.

Yelloweye Rockfish

Yelloweye rockfish are the quintessential Alaskan fish. Among the largest of the rockfish species, a big yelloweye jigged up from depth makes a fine photo fit for a postcard. (It’s one of my biggest bucketlist rockfish since moving to the last frontier several years ago.) They’re common and fairly easy to find in and around Kodiak waters all the way down to Prince William Sound.

Tiger Rockfish and China Rockfish

Okay, technically two species, but these are favorites of Capt. Brian McKay of Alaska Outdoors Addiction. While on the smaller side of the rockfish spectrum, they’re beautiful fish, often caught at depths of 100 to 300 feet (and sometimes as deep as 800 to 1,000 feet). They readily hit jigs on light tackle. Tigers are also a favorite of biologist Adam St. Saviour, a researcher with the state of Alaska, as they’re a rare species to catch compared to others. We’ll talk later with St. Saviour about conservation.

Shortraker Rockfish

Gaining notoriety after the 48-pound state record was caught last July in Alaska, shortraker rockfish are known for hanging out deep. Captain Ray Nix, of Crazy Ray’s Adventures, deep-drops herring or octopus on circle hooks with halibut sticks at least 800 feet down to target these fish. By all accounts, it’s quite a chore to crank them up, but worth the experience for a once-in-a-lifetime catch. Electric reels are the preferred tackle method in this scenario.

Fly Fishing for Rockfish

Captain Brian McKay developed a method for clients who want to take rockfish on the fly off the coast of Kodiak Island, Alaska. He suggests switching things up by having one angler “man the jig” with a hookless lure to entice the fish higher in the water column and whip them into a feeding frenzy. Once the fish are jigged up higher, they will cooperate with any big streamers in your fly box, including a super-sized Russian river or popsicle style.

Rockfish Conservation

Catching up with Adam St. Saviour, a research biologist for the Southcentral Region with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, we’d be remiss if we didn’t cover one major conservation aspect of fishing for rockfish. Rockfish are susceptible to overfishing and bad management practice. They’re also prone to barotrauma during their release, which can kill the fish.

In Alaska, it is imperative for anglers to carry a deep-water release mechanism for rockfish in the boat. These devices are designed to return a rockfish back near the bottom where it was hooked, or to a specified depth, to assist the fish in recompression and up chances of post-release survival. Anglers can find more information about deep-water releases from the organization Return ‘Em Right.

About the Author: Cody McLaughlin is an outdoor writer, conservationist and hunting advocate based in Alaska. He recently launched Trout Stream Studios as an executive producer for podcasts and livestreams in the hunting and veterans’ affairs spaces – including for the Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation’s The Sportsmen’s Voice Podcast, the popular Blood Origins Podcast, and the Veterans’ Affairs Administration’s National Center for PTSD. He serves currently on the board of the Alaska Outdoor Council and is a former board member and lead spokesman of the New Jersey Outdoor Alliance.

The post Targeting Rockfish in the Pacific Northwest appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

Gusts to 25 knots out of the ­southwest stacked 2-foot waves atop 3-footers. What should have been a beautiful late fall day was quickly becoming a misery trip as torrents of salt water blew over the bow with the frequency of a punk-rock drumbeat.

My wife released her white-knuckle death grip on the console rail just long enough to punch me in the shoulder. She started to yell what surely would’ve been an expletive when she was cut short by a curtain of Chesapeake Bay brine.

“Trust me,” I shouted over the wind blast. “Three more minutes of this and we’ll be in the clear.”

By “in the clear” I meant that we’d round Point Lookout into the lee, and the wave height would drop by two-thirds. I certainly didn’t mean to imply I’d be clear of her wrath — it was obviously too late for that. But the second shoulder punch told me that she didn’t quite realize what I meant: Being in the lee of a point of land versus being on the windward side can make the difference between utter misery and fishing in relative comfort.

Finding Refuge from Windy Weather on the Water

Experienced anglers certainly know how very important the combination of wind speed and geography can be. It’s a lesson learned early.

As a child, I remember rushing to the window the moment I awoke on Saturday mornings to look at the treetops. No movement in those higher branches meant calm seas; a few rustling leaves was OK, but swaying treetops meant that rousting Dad out of bed would be a wasted effort.

Most open-water outings depend on decent weather conditions, which deteriorate more frequently in winter due to repeated cold fronts. During those months, the Jet Stream tends to push south. Nor’easters develop along the East Coast, and polar air flows south until it collides with warm air from the Gulf of Mexico.

While wind speeds along most of the northern Gulf Coast average 5 to 6 mph during the summer, they build to an average of 9 to 10 mph in winter, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The Atlantic coast averages 6 to 7 mph during summer and 9 to 10 mph during winter. And in Florida, average winds build from summer’s 7 to 8 mph to winter’s 10 to 12 mph.

Wind patterns can be somewhat predictable, and we can plan fishing around that. Any East Coast angler, for example, knows that a few calm days in a row often follow the violence of a cold front. But weather patterns have been changing in recent years; when it comes to wind speeds, they appear to be growing stronger over time. According to research performed at Australia’s Swinburne University of Technology and published in the journal Science, wind speeds have increased globally by 5 percent over the past 20 years.

However, a few places in the country offer a perfect combination of geography and prevailing winds. That is, they remain fishable in most or all conditions short of a gale — regardless of the season.

We chose six weather havens that deserve national ranking for both top-notch fishing, inshore and nearshore, and protection from wind and approaching storms.

San Diego Bay is Sheltered from the Wind

San Diego Bay benefits from a north-south orientation in an area that sees prevailing westerly winds virtually all year long. At just 1 to 3 miles wide, the bay never presents a very long draw over which westbound waves can build.

During winter, though, the bay can be hit by Santa Ana winds. These gusty, dry desert blows, which emanate out of the east, can compress while moving through canyons, and eventually peak at more than 100 mph inland. They’re commonly closer to 20 to 30 mph along the coast, but that’s plenty strong enough to hit anglers where it hurts. All that considered, San Diego Bay still gains a leg up when it comes to finding a lee, thanks to the intervention of man.

“San Diego Bay is 14 miles long and surrounded by land for most of that distance,” says Capt. James Nelson, a San Diego guide dubbed “the fish icon.” “Most of that land is incorporated, and downtown San Diego (on the northeast corner of the bay) has buildings to 497 feet high. This helps protect the bay from wind on most of the days that we would be on the water.”

Just what does Nelson target in San Diego Bay? A surprisingly wide range of species, including spotted bay, sand and calico bass; corvina; croaker; halibut; sharks; and even the vaunted West Coast bonefish.

“This makes San Diego Bay not only one of the best fisheries around, but also a comfortable place to be on a boat,” he says.

Louisiana’s Protection from the Wind

When it comes to twisting, turning waterways with lee shores aplenty, regardless of wind direction, a salt-marsh fishery can be tough to beat. And when it comes to salt-marsh fishing for species such as spotted seatrout, flounder, black drum and especially red drum, the Louisiana coast ranks high on the list.

While the Mississippi River delta offers a plethora of wind-sheltered ­locations, anglers must consider the way the wind affects fishing in the marshes. “Our area is strongly affected by winds [which pick up in the winter months but commonly peak during the spring], but what wind does is affect the waterways we can access,” says Capt. David Bourgeois, of Big Dog Fishing Charters, in Lafitte, Louisiana, just south of New Orleans. “When winds are strong from the north and west, water is pushed out of the Barataria Basin and into the Gulf of Mexico. During these times, there are plenty of oil-and-gas-field access canals that are productive for fishing, and where we can hide from the wind.

“However, we have to deal with very shallow water and have to be careful not only fishing, but when running to our spots to make sure we don’t hit any usually submerged items or run aground.”

South winds create the opposite effect, pushing water up into the marsh and bayous. “South winds that raise our water levels allow us to fish areas we couldn’t otherwise access, such as ponds, flats and shallow bayous,” he says.

Fishing Key West When Windy

Anglers in Key West — and throughout much of the Keys — benefit from the ability to fish either the Atlantic Ocean or the Gulf of Mexico, depending on conditions. Even when all the surrounding waters roil, captains can tuck behind small islands that block the wind.

“We’re pretty lucky,” says Capt. Rush Maltz, of Odyssea Key West Sportfishing. “In the summer, we have prevailing winds out of the southeast, and in the winter, lots of east and northeast. We also get a lot of cold fronts moving through in the winter, and winds blow at 20 knots or more. But we can almost always find a place to fish.”

When it’s blowing out of the east, and seas in the Atlantic stack up to 6 or 7 feet, Gulf waves might only measure 1 to 3 feet, he explains. “On days the Gulf is unfishable, we might still be able to run offshore in the Atlantic and catch sailfish.

“Sometimes we can stay right in the harbor, where it’s almost always sheltered, and catch tarpon, or maybe permit or cobia, and snapper are always around. You don’t always have to go very far around here to catch fish. As a guide, this is great. While most of the coast might be stuck, we have options.”

This does, of course, affect which fisheries may be targeted on any given day. While sailfish and mahi might be plentiful on the Atlantic side, fishing the Gulf might mean going for grouper or snapper instead. On days with too much bluster for either option, backcountry and flats areas offer species such as tarpon, permit and bonefish. In other words, taking advantage of this weather flexibility means remaining open-minded about target choice.

“Instead of just saying we’re blown out, we change it up,” Maltz says. “We can still have a great day of fishing. And nine out of 10 anglers have no problem with that at all.”

Hide in the Outer Banks from the Wind

Take one glance at a map of the North Carolina Outer Banks and you can see that whichever way a strong wind blows, anglers can find sheltered waters somewhere in the sounds, bays or along the beach. On an east or west wind, for example, the slot between Roanoke Island and the mainland in Croatan Sound, and between Roanoke and the barrier islands in Roanoke Sound, should be quite protected. If the winds hump out of the north, the waters south of Wanchese should enjoy a lee. And if a southerly riles things up, the waters of Kitty Hawk Bay should remain relatively placid. That shelter can extend, at times, out into the ocean on the northeast or southwest side of Cape Hatteras and the east or west side of Cape Lookout.

Capt. Joey VanDyke, who has mated on offshore boats out of Oregon Inlet and Hatteras and today runs inshore, offshore and bay charters on the 27-foot custom Carolina-style Fingeance, has seen every aspect of how, where and when to alter fishing tactics to keep casting right through a blow.

“We’re very diverse here in the Outer Banks,” he says. “We’re mentally and physically able to change it up at the drop of a hat. From one day to the next, we might go from sight-casting for cobia in the ocean to targeting drum up on the grass flats in the sound. When the wind starts blowing, we have a plan A and a plan B — and a plan C and even a plan D.”

While most anglers happily adapt, some ­tourists don’t always get it. “We try to explain it to clients; we try to break it down for them and help them understand why the wind can make one area or another, and even a particular type of fishing, less productive,” VanDyke explains. “Take sight-casting for cobia, for example. There are times when the water’s too churned up for that to work from a blow the day before, even though now it’s calm enough to fish for them. But chumming might still be an option.

“Or, we might need to focus on a different species entirely. Sometimes it takes a little while, and sometimes we take them out and let them have a look. But as long as people are willing, we have a very unique opportunity here to find good fishing in most wind ­conditions, almost year-round.”

Chesapeake Comfort from the Winds

Having fished the Chesapeake Bay my entire life, I’ve taken advantage countless times of its rather erratic shorelines and plentiful tributaries to find a lee regardless of wind direction. But the bay’s combination of shoals and channels means that wind doesn’t need a long reach to create a tight, nearly vertical chop.

A 1-foot chop can be uncomfortable in a small boat. Two-footers can pound out your fillings while running, and roll your boat from side to side like a carnival ride while adrift. If you’re not careful, you might soak your wife in salt spray and earn yourself a punch or two. But no matter the direction the winds blow — even during the winter, when wind direction is unpredictable and you’re quite likely to have a 15-knot breeze — fishable waters can almost always be found in the middle bay at or around the Chesapeake Bay bridges.

Spanning just over 4 miles from the western to eastern shores, the twin spans of the bay bridges feature literally hundreds of pilings, some as long and wide as an 18-wheeler, as well as two artificial islands known as “the rock piles.” The islands not only break the wind but also the waves.

If the wind is blowing out of the east or west, one side of the bay or the other is bound to be relatively calm. And if it’s blowing out of the north or south, one side of the bridge or the other is significantly calmer. When the conditions are fishable but still uncomfortable, you can always take a break in the lee of one of the islands.

Added bonus: The bridges offer some of the best structure in the entire Chesapeake Bay, and quite often, the striped bass fishing here excels. Throughout the year, anglers can pluck school-size stripers to 30 inches from around the pilings by casting jigs on light tackle, live-baiting, or trolling tandem and umbrella rigs up and down the lane between the two bridges.

In early spring and late fall, trophy-size fish migrate in and out of the area. In fact, the largest striper I ever hooked in the Chesapeake struck beneath the east span of the north bridge. We fought it for a solid 20 minutes before it broke 40-pound test with a rod-pumping head-shake, ensuring I’ll always dream of hooking a fish like that again in the shadows of the Chesapeake Bay bridges.

Martha’s Vineyard Variety

Martha’s Vineyard benefits from a ­combination of tall wind-breaking bluffs near areas with strong current, numerous nearby islands and a fairly consistent westerly prevailing wind pattern. This adds up to options — lots of options — when the wind blows.

“You can always find a lee, and you can always find a place where there’s wind in your face too,” says Julian Pepper, a senior staff member and 20-year veteran at Larry’s Tackle Shop, the oldest such establishment on the island. “If you’re a fly-fisherman and you need protection from the wind, you can always go somewhere like Chappaquiddick and fish near the bluffs, where there’s also good current and good fishing. Between the sound, the islands and the ocean, there’s almost always a good place to fish.”

While the Vineyard is best known for its striped bass fishery, which starts in May and usually hits full swing in June, in the fall, false albacore can be found close to leeward shores. Even in winter, fish like tautog can be found in waters close enough to the lee to remain protected.

“It’s at its best when you get a blow for a couple of days. That pushes bait in,” Pepper says. “And then the wind turns. You can be in the lee, have clean water and some of the best fishing around.”

Battling the Breeze

Even in protected waters, strong winds make fishing tough. Casting becomes an issue, trolling lines might be pushed into one another and the wind can blow big bends in your line, reducing the ability to feel a bite. Use these simple tips and tactics to catch more fish in the maelstrom.

• When throwing lures or bait, remember to position your boat to allow casting with the wind. If that’s not possible, cast side-armed and low to the water.

• When trolling, try to head directly into or directly with the wind. When the breeze hits the boat on its beam, lines are much more likely to blow into one another. If that’s not possible, place your heaviest lures with the most drag on the upwind side of the spread and your lighter lures on the downwind side to keep the light lines from being blown atop the heavier ones.

• When fishing topwater in a strong wind, walk the dog with a stickbait rather than choosing a chugger or popper. The more abrupt jerk needed for popping some lures can lead to lots of cartwheeling (and the associated tangles).

The post Fishing Success in Windy Weather appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

During the winter months, mama croakers spew their eggs into high-salinity offshore waters, where they’re fertilized by daddy croakers, and then, in the afterglow, both mama and daddy head off to find something to eat, leaving the youngsters to fend for themselves. Maybe it’s parental malpractice, but Mother Nature shrugs. She couldn’t care less.

Along the Louisiana coast, the larval and post-larval croakers are pushed by the tides into shallow waters, where they use seagrasses and detritus to hide from predators and feast on rotifers, copepods and even the very detritus that serves as their home.

Eventually, though, the fish outgrow the marshes, and begin to migrate in the spring. That’s when they face a murderer’s row of speckled trout — and unwittingly provide anglers with some of the best fishing action of the year.

Croaker Chaos

For the growing croakers, big spring tides are both a blessing and a curse. Riding the conveyor belt of the tides is how juvenile croakers make their way into the bigger bays, but these strong currents also slam the fish into ledge walls that disorient them and make them easy prey for specks. This, in turn, makes the trout easy prey for anglers.

It happens every spring in South Louisiana, and is most consistent in brackish marshes, where juvenile croakers proliferate. Anglers who want to maximize their productivity simply ride around looking for what locals call “boiling water.” Boiling-water areas show upwellings on the surface, where hard currents hit ledge walls and are forced upward. These are most commonly found in winding bayous with 10 to 20 feet of depth. Not every ledge wall will hold fish, but a high percentage of them do, and an angler who hits enough of them will certainly find a bite that has him posting pictures on social media.

Best baits, far and away, are 3½-inch soft-plastic paddle tails that most accurately mimic the size and action of the migrating croakers. Louisiana anglers fish those on ⅜-ounce jigheads, and will sometimes add a ¼-ounce jighead-and-paddletail combo fished as a double rig when currents are particularly swift. Figuring out how fish orient at each ledge wall is part of the fun, and shrewd anglers will frequently change their angles to find feeding specks. Hooked fish regularly upchuck juvenile croakers onto the boat decks of successful anglers. Often these fish are so recently ingested, they can be thrown overboard, where they swim down, probably to be eaten by another trout.

Spring Seatrout Success

Depending on water temperature, the bite will begin around the first of March and stretch almost to the summer solstice. By then, most of the mature specks have moved offshore to spawn, leaving behind only the undersized immature fish, along with a host of pests, like hardheads and gafftops.

But during the run, the specks are shockingly large for Louisiana marsh fish. An 18-inch average is about the norm, and several fish in the schools will stretch between 20 and 24 inches. In comparison, anglers fishing marsh lakes and expansive bays during this same time of year will typically be plagued by undersized and barely legal fish.

Though specks are the primary beneficiaries of the croaker migration, other species also notice and take advantage of the easy meals. Redfish are ever present, and the pattern delivers far more bites from black drum, flounder and largemouth bass than unfamiliar anglers might expect. Given the onslaught, it defies belief that any croaker survives to reach offshore waters and complete the spawn cycle, but clearly a whole bunch do. Despite getting no help from their parents.

The post The Best Spring Seatrout Bait appeared first on Sport Fishing Mag.

Because braided line has such a thin diameter, the importance of knots used to connect braid to a length of mono or fluorocarbon leader takes on greater significance. Most anglers choose to use a leader with braid, but based on the results of this challenge, it would seem that many are losing 30, 40 and even more than 50 percent of the braid’s breaking strength at that knot. On the other hand, some knots retain 90 to 100 percent of the braid’s strength. The fundamental purpose of this knot challenge is to share with Sport Fishing enthusiasts which knots are the strongest and how they are tied.

How We Tested 53 Fishing Knots

Before we look more closely at the winning knots, here’s how the challenge worked. Those who answered our call for participants could enter in either the light-braid category (15-pound braid to 30-pound fluorocarbon leader) or the heavy-braid category (50-pound braid to 80-pound fluorocarbon), or both. All were sent the same braid and leader so everyone would be working with the same materials.

Specifically, entrants used Spiderwire Stealth Blue Camo Braid in 15-pound-test and Spiderwire Stealth Glow-Vis Braid in 50-pound-test as their main line, tying to Berkley ProSpec fluorocarbon leader in 30-pound and 80-pound, respectively. The 15-pound Spiderwire braid actually broke at 34.4 pounds, on average; the 50-pound Spiderwire broke at 62.8 pounds. That means knots would have had to break at 34.4 and 62.8 pounds to achieve 100 percent strength.

Keep in mind the bottom-line goal of this challenge: Determine the strongest possible knots to connect braid to leader. Given that objective, there were few restrictions. Some tied a double line in the braid, some did not. A few applied glue to their knots. Whatever worked was fair game, as we can all benefit from that knowledge. Those who elected to tie a double line (most often with a Bimini twist) then had two knots to test; they were submitting a “knot system,” if you will.

It was essential to determine which of the two knots tested weaker; that registered as the “weak link” in their system, and that knot was the one that would determine the strength of their method of connecting braid to leader. (In some cases, the weaker knot was the Bimini twist; in other cases, the knot connecting the doubled braid to the leader proved weaker.)

Each entrant submitted three samples of the same knot, so the strength measured represents the mean of the three break tests.

The Best Knots for 15-Pound Braided Fishing Line

As the charts you’ll see a bit farther down show, the strength of these knots was pretty much all over the place, from 100 percent to as little as about 17 percent. For lighter braid (15-pound tied to 30-pound fluoro), here are the three strongest knots, in order.

PR Bobbin Knot — 84.3 Percent Break Strength

Tied by Capt. Bryan Dietz of Merritt Island, Florida

Improved FG Knot — 80.9 Percent Break Strength

Tied by Capt. Tim Simos of Fort Pierce, Florida

FG knot — 73.4 Percent Break Strength

Tied by Ralph Green of Mount Pleasant, South Carolina

The Best Knots for 50-Pound Braided Fishing Line

For heavier braid (50-pound tied to 80-pound fluoro), here are the four strongest knots, in order.

GT Knot — 100 Percent Break Strength

Tied by Chad Nisely of Painesville, Ohio

PR Bobbin Knot — 99.5 Percent Break Strength

Tied by Bryan Dietz of Merritt Island, Florida

Improved Bristol Knot — 92.1 Percent Break Strength

Tied by Doug Olander of Winter Park, Florida

Improved FG Knot — 82.1 Percent Break Strength

Tied by Capt. Tim Simos of Fort Pierce, Florida

Two Charts Showing the Strongest Fishing Knots

What to Consider When Tying Fishing Knots

Knot-tiers are becoming more sophisticated, at least based on comparison to a similar Sport Fishing knot challenge years ago. Most of the winning knots here aren’t simple or quickly tied (many best tied the evening before a fishing trip rather than on the water in a hurry in rough seas), but the results speak for themselves.

Another change from the previous knot challenge is the prevalence of single-line knots among better entries. That is, years ago, most of the strongest knots tested were formed from a double line made with a Bimini twist, such as a Bristol (aka Yucatan or no-name knot). This year, only one such knot scored among the best. All other top knots tie the single-strand main line directly to the leader. The FG knot has become quite popular, for example. Also, it should be noted that the time some anglers took to tie elaborate knots connecting doubled braid to leader wasn’t effectively spent since their Bimini twists broke first.

It seems that tying knots approaching 100-percent strength might be inherently more difficult with lighter braided line. The percentages of the two best results with 15-pound braid were in the lower 80s, while three entries with 50-pound braid tested between 92 and 100 percent. (Two knots finished among the top three in both light- and heavy-braid categories, but tested weaker with the lighter braid).

It’s not just the knot; how it’s tied is strategic. That is, in some cases, very similar or even the same knots tied by different entrants tested far differently, suggesting slight variations in how they were tied could make a considerable difference.

Albrights and double-uni knots are very popular — but are they the best knots? One result consistent in this challenge was that Albright and uni knots to connect braid to leader scored pretty low. Lots of anglers — and pros — swear by them, and certainly, a knot you can tie efficiently, with lots of confidence, is important. But the Instron tester suggests anglers can do better.

How to Tie the PR Bobbin Knot

How to Tie the Improved FG Knot

How to Tie the GT Knot

How to Tie the Improved Bristol Knot

Top Fishing Captains Favorite Knots

I asked these charter captains and guides how they choose to connect a braid main line to a fluoro or mono leader. Here’s what they said:

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