The gag grouper season has ended offshore too, but we still have tons of fish to go target like red grouper, scamp grouper, mangrove snapper, vermillions and MORE. This next month we will be fishing a little deeper to get the biggest mangrove snapper and fat red grouper, with hopefully a side of the scamp grouper, too. Closer to 160-200ft of water is where we plan to target to find these fish.
Red grouper love the squid strips, live pinfish and whole threadfins on those deeper water potholes or cracks in that flat hard bottom area. They are more ‘grazers’ across the hard bottom areas so finding a big concentration can be tough, especially this time of year but luckily the mangrove snapper are often mixed in with these guys too.
Mangrove snapper are moving a bit deeper offshore but they are going to hopefully bite very well in a large average size like they did for us last January. The double snell rig with around 40lb test and double snelled 5-6ot hooks are a great way to target these larger mangrove snapper offshore. This time of year we see cobia, tuna, occasional kingfish and wahoo offshore too for the pelagic species so make sure to have some rods rigged in case something happens to swim by your boat while you are offshore fishing!
