Coastal Fishing Connections Newsletter - 8/27/2018
- Coastal Fishing Connections
- Aug 27, 2018
- 15 min read
Amberjack Techniques
In part 2 of "The Essentials of Kayak Fishing," Scott Kennedy shared some of the more important things to consider when rigging your kayak for fishing success. This week, we asked Captain Dustin Reed to talk about amberjack fishing tactics. Capt. Dustin has been working as a private captain the past few weeks as he finishes his welding inspection school.
Captain Dustin Reed is 37 years old and grew up in a house on Fort bayou in Ocean Springs MS. He was first introduced to fishing from his uncles and grandpa. At the young age of 13 he knew exactly what he wanted to do for a living. Dustin started working summers on the back deck of his uncles boat at 16 and later went on to work for Due South charters out of Biloxi MS after high school until 2001, when he bought his first business and boat “Blue Bayou Charters."
Captain Dustin has run charter/private boats from Venice LA all the way down to “Bud and Mary’s” in Islamorada FL. Currently, he is running a private boat out of Ft. Morgan for a family from North Mississippi.
Captain Dustin shares with us his tactics for success while fishing for amberjack, aka reef donkeys.
"When I’m targeting AJ’s out of Alabama, the one thing I know for sure is that live bait is critical. They will chew on just about anything alive and swimming well. Live hard tails are my number one choice, but a ruby red lip will work just as well. Typically we catch our live bait on the way out by dropping a chicken rig to the bottom. 8 out of 10 times, if your fishing on the bottom directly above the reef, you’ll catch ruby reds. If I stop on a fad and see hard tails, I rig up a double speckled trout rig and fish it with the same action I would use fishing for trout. I typically try to have three times the number of live baits for the limit we are trying to achieve. For instance, if we have a 6 man crew, we will try to get at least 18 live baits.
The type structure I'm fishing determines the type tackle and how I’m rigging for Amberjack. I find that steel vertical structures seem to hold the AJ’s best, for instance the LULU or the New Venture. While fishing this kind of structure, 9 of 10 times I'm sending the bait down on a free line. This line consists of a 100 plus pound class swivel, 6 feet of 100 lb flourocarbon leader and an 8/0 Gamakatsu 4X strong live bait hook.
When I pull up to my mark, I circle it a few times to identify the depth and of where the fish are. Many times they are the larger marks up higher in the water column. I hook my live bait just forward of the dorsal fin, directly behind the head. This allows your bait fish to swim directly towards the structure. Drop your bait in and free line it down. Typically, your bait is going to dive hard and when danger is lurking, it will all of a sudden stop. When the bait stops, you know your at the right depth, so be ready to feel the pickup of the bait. Let the fish take it for about 3 seconds before you set the hook. After setting the hook keep your line tight and reel as fast and hard as you can to keep that fish out of structure.
If I’m fishing a natural bottom, the only change I make is adding an 8 oz lead ahead of the swivel on the top shot. I also hook my live baits different too. I will hook them through the top lip so your bait will have a more natural appearance. The reason I add the lead is because the jacks usually hold deeper and closer to the reef on a natural bottom."
Thank you Captain for those rigging and catching tips. Captain Dustin will be live with us next Sunday night at 8 p.m. to answer more questions about fishing for amberjack. Even though amberjack season is slated to be open for a few more months, reality is that it may be only open a few more weeks. Legal amberjack must be 34 inches to the middle of the fork.
News, Notes and More!
Saltwater Finaddicts held their annual Inshore Championship this past weekend. To successfully pull off such an event requires countless hours of dedicated volunteers. Each day the temperatures were nice before sunrise, but sweltering hot once the sun got up in the sky a little. The rain held up for most of the weekend until just prior to the final weigh-in on Sunday. The full moon had the speckled trout bite a little slow but it didn't stop people from bringing in beautiful bags and coolers of fish. Congrats to all the winners and thank you Justin and the team for providing such a great event for the Gulf Coast fishing community.
For information on what's biting, what to use and other tips to catch more fish, check out the guide reports each week. We cover Orange Beach to the Mississippi Sound. Be sure and check out MeMe's kitchen below for a great new recipe.
This week, the cooler daytime highs will stick with us and rain chances will hover around 50% for the majority of the week. Tidal movement will be virtually nil until the latter part of the week. Offshore, seas are forecast to be around 2 feet for the majority of the week with the occasional pop-up shower.
Until next time, Get out there, keep those lines tight and rods bent!
These reports require a collaborative effort from all the contributors, so please click their link and follow their social media accounts. Look for the column header that says weekly drawing, email your answer to coastalfishingconnections@gmail.com to get in the drawing held on Facebook live on Sunday nights @coastalfishingconnections at 8 p.m.
Also, subscribe on our website at www.bentoutfittersfishing.com to receive these reports as they come out. Please leave comments at the bottom of the blog after reading and let us know if you find the information interesting and helpful.
MeMe's Coastal Delights by Melinda Ellis
Hey guys! This next recipe might be a little copy-cat of an awesome appetizer from a little known “yacht club” around town...;). I always order these when I go there but decided about a year ago to try to duplicate them at home and I think I got it pretty darn close! These are a great crowd pleaser and can easily be a meal in themselves. Serve ‘em with some tarter or comeback sauce and eat up!
Crab Hash-Puppies
2 cups self-rising yellow cornmeal
1 cup self-rising flour
1 lb crabmeat
1 1/2 cups hash browns
2 cups shredded cheese
1 1/2 cups milk
3 large eggs
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1/2 teaspoon of onion powder
1 teaspoon of pepper
1 teaspoon of Tony’s
(You can add chopped jalapeño’s if you like a little more kick)
Mix all together in large mixing bowl.
Mixture should be thick but not dry.
(If it’s too dry add a little milk. If it’s too soupy add a little cornmeal until it’s thick)
Heat Vegetable oil in deep style frying pan or pot until med/hi
Once oil is hot, scoop up spoon size portions of cornmeal mixture and drop in hot grease. Fry until golden brown but be careful and not fry them too quick because the hash-puppies won’t be done all the way through.
Sponsor Spotlight
Bent Outfitters Fishing is offers inshore and offshore fishing charters and sunset cruises from Mobile to Orange Beach. For our inshore trips we operate a 22 foot Cape Horn center console that can accommodate 4-5 anglers. For offshore trips, we operate a 28 foot Nautic Star center console boat and offer reef, trolling, deep dropping and bluewater trips.
In Fairhope, we operate out of Fly Creek Marina. In Orange Beach, we do all pickups at Caribe Marina.
Captain Billy provides fun, family oriented fishing adventures for families across the country.
Check out our his social media links and website below under his report for the week.
Weekly Giveaway
This week, we will be giving away a Bent Outfitters Fishing t-shirt and visor!
Read below and get in the drawing for this weeks' giveaway!
What kind of fishing did Captain Jay Obrien do on his second day of his Alaskan Adventure?
Congratulations to Jimmy Williamson, winner of the Bama Beach Bum Fishing's "It's a Pomp" shirt and #staybummy decal.
Submit your answer via email to coastalfishingconnections@gmail.com
Like and Follow the 2 new social media accounts set up for the weekly report and share our report to get an extra entry into the drawing.
And NOW to this weeks Reports...
Mobile Delta
Dippi Outdoors - Dip McMillian
Email: alkeenmcmillan87@gmail.com
Phone: 251-747-9261
Dip says, "The full moon made the crappie bite tough this weekend. The big crappies are definitely in shutdown mode, and only the juveniles are active right now. I fly fished the majority of my trip yesterday morning and the bull breams were hitting the popping bug non-stop. The last hour of my trip, I started crappie fishing and managed to catch a few keepers as well.
The Dippi Outdoor Crappie Tournament was a tough going with the slow bite, but the guys still had a blast!! Here below is 1st and 2nd place winners.
Yesterday morning I took my buddy Trent back on the Tensaw to catch some bull breams and crappie. We ended the morning with a good mess of fish.
Thank you Dip for that outstanding report! If you like to freshwater fish and want to to the where and how, contact Dip to go have some fun in the delta catching some crappies!
Surfside
Orange Beach - Gulf Shores – Fort Morgan
Bama Beach Bum Fishing - Matthew Isbell
Facebook: @bamabeachbumfishing
Instagram: @bamabeachbum_fishing
Cell: 334-391-5913
Matt joined us on Coastal Fishing Connections, Sunday night live broadcast this week and answered questions about how he got started, his passion for fishing and Scott Kennedy's shorts. For the full broadcast, go to Coastal Fishing Connections on Facebook and take a few minutes to watch Matt's live Q&A session! It was a hoot!
This is what he had to say. "Just started to see some bull reds showing up! We were hooking at least one per trip this past week. They have been hungry and not too picky on what they will eat. I’ve caught them on dead shrimp and Fishbites as well as cut bait. There are quite a few pinfish in some areas and that seems to be what has drawn them in close to shore. We also have female blue crabs coming into the shallow surf water to lay eggs. This has continued to give us good opportunities at black drum and some big whiting." Here are a few pictures from our trips this past week!
Matthew Isbell is the one and only, Bama Beach bum and has been guiding visitors to fish catching experiences in the surf. Not only does he offer guided surf fishing trips, but he also does a lot of instructional videos to help people catch more fish in the surf. His Youtube channel currently has over 2800 subscribers. Click on his link above for more information on how to book a trip with him.
The Pier Review
Captain David Collins
Captain Collins says, "GS Pier is producing spanish mackerel pretty good now, along with some speckled trout. A few more of these cool mornings and that dip in water temperature we need, will happen. Shorter length of daylight and more North winds...COME ON FALL!!!
Keep up with the latest Gulf State Pier information at GSPierfishing.com. or on Alabama Pier Rats.
Offshore Report
Orange Beach, Alabama
Bent Outfitters Fishing - Captain Billy Howell
Facebook: @bentoutfittersfishing
Instagram: @bent_outfitters_fishing
Website: www.bentoutfittersfishing.com
Cell: 601-938-7161
In speaking with Captain David Collins, he says, "the tuna bite has been pretty good for those who can get out there and find them. This is only going to get better as the days get shorter." Captain Dustin Reed has been doing some captaining for a private vessel the past few weeks and found a sizzling amberjack bite mixing in a few superb scamp. Captain Bobby Kelly of Miss Brianna has been wearing out the grouper the past few weeks. Results of one of those trips is pictured below.
Captain Billy says, "On Friday this past week, we decided to make a run to target amberjack. For those who haven't really been amberjack fishing, big live active baits are a must, so we stopped on the way out to catch some. We caught about 16 live baits and decided to head on the "THE SPOT." We arrived at the spot and free lined a live ruby red lip on one side of the boat and dropped another weighted line down. Wouldn't you know it, a big amberjack smoked the free-lined bait within seconds of the deployment. For about an hour, we had fast and furious activity before picking up and heading to try some other spots.
Over the weekend, instead of heading offshore, we fished the Saltwater Finaddicts Inshore Championship. I was fortunate to be invited to fish with my buddy Kevin Chalk and his son Lucas. We settled on the team name "Chalk It Up" and ALMOST made it happen. After purchasing our own team in the Calcutta at the captains meeting Thursday night, we had an opportunity to win some real money. For the tournament, we decided to really focus on flounder since there was a huge prize package for the team that weighed in the most live flounder for the AMRD flounder rebuilding program. AMRD had hoped to get 25 live flounder all year long, In this tournament alone, there were over 20 live flounder brought in. Saturday morning we started out flounder fishing, got a few bites but no hookups so we moved on. At our next spot, we got hammered by mangrove snapper until I got a welcome surprise, a 5.24 lb speckled trout. Besides giving high 5's it gave us a great start to our inshore slam.
Next we moved on and started working on flounder again. While flounder fishing we caught a couple redfish including my winning leopard redfish (23 spots). As we continued working the area, we picked up our first flounder of the tournament right before the weigh-in opened. By lunch time, our slam was complete but we needed upgrades. Unfortunately, our speckled trout died right before getting laid on the weigh-in scale. Congratulations to Mike Nicholas for winning the live weigh-in category for speckled trout with a 5.26 lb trout. We ended the day with a small upgrade to our redfish but not our flounder.
Two day tournaments are extremely taxing on the body and soul but we knew what we had to do, so we got back at it early. Within the first few hours, Kevin caught a 3.51 lb flounder to give us a much needed upgrade. We continued to work on our redfish but never were able upgrade. We finished out of the money in the calcutta by 0.55 lbs and the overall inshore slam category by 1.1 lbs. The 2.4 lb redfish got us. The tournament was very well organized and I look forward to fishing it again."
INSHORE REPORT
Orange Beach / Perdido Key / Gulf Shores - Wolf Bay - ICW
The mangrove snapper bite continues to be on fire in Orange Beach around any kind of structure especially the concrete ones. Redfish continue to be on fire under the lights at night time and a few are being caught under the Perdido Pass bridge. The spanish bite has picked up nearshore as the water has cleared up somewhat and water temperatures has dropped. The presence of large schools of bait at the surface has diminished but you can still find if you keep your eyes peeled.
Mobile Bay - Dauphin Island – Fort Morgan
Irish Wake Fishing - Captain Jay O’Brien
Facebook: @ IrishWake Fishing
Instagram: @Irish Wake Fishing
Website: www.irishwakefishing.com
Phone: 251-272-4285
Captain JayO is back in action but rather than sharing an inshore report this week, he shares a little about his trip to Yukon country.
"We went off the grid last week, literally. We ventured out to the last frontier, Alaska.
We were based along the Kenai River staying at a lodge called Cusack’s on the Kenai. The lodge was beautiful and had all the amenities you could ask for from a complete chef’s kitchen to a fish processing area complete with commercial grade vacuum sealer and flash freezer.
The first day of fishing was spent exploring the Swanson River on a self guided trip. The fishing was excellent as we put together a beautiful 6 man limit of Silver Salmon aka Coho and also caught some pink salmon as well.
The second day of fishing was spent on a Halibut charter with AFishunt Charters out of Ninilchik on the FV Hard Eight. We fished in about 100’ of water in the Cook Inlet and put together a 9 person limit in short order.
The third day of fishing was a short self guided trip before dark where the Russian and Kenai rivers converge. This was a fly only area so it was fun learning a new technique. Most in the group caught their first fish on a fly. My wife got hers on her third cast which was well before I got one!
The fourth day of fishing my wife, daughter and I chartered Captain Dustin Klepacki of D’s Fishing Company to fish the Kenai from a boat. We had a blast putting together our 3 person limit of Silvers together thanks to Captain Dustin’s knowledge.
The rest of the trip was spent sight seeing and relaxing. Alaska is even more beautiful in person then people tell you. We saw some awe inspiring things in nature too along the way from whales, otters, seals, moose, glaciers and bears. The food was also incredible. I would highly recommend going to Alaska if you have ever considered it and if you haven’t considered it, you should!"
Captain JayO is very mobile running trips from Dauphin Island to Fort Morgan. Captain JayO has years of experience fishing our local waters and is sure to provide you and your family with a fun-filled, fish catching experience on the water. Irish Wake Fishing’s motto is Trophies, Groceries and Good Times!
Irish Wake Fishing would also like to thank their sponsors Islamorada Boatworks, Cajun Custom Rods and Smith Optics.
Eastern Shore - Mobile Bay - Dauphin Island
Ugly Fishing - Captain Patric Garmeson
Facebook: @ugly.fishing
Instagram: @ugly_fishing
Website: www.uglyfishing.com
Cell: 251-747-1554
Diversity versus specialty
"In the world of fishing you can be diverse and target a variety of fish using a variety of methods. You can have specialties that you key in on throughout the year and be a true species and / or tactic specialist.
This past week actually began in Jacksonville Florida where I had the opportunity to fish with a speckled trout specialist, Eddie Cabler. Ed, a native of Jacksonville showed me around his home waters for a few hours while targeting speckled trout. I was able to pick his brain about his fishery and his tactics while we made cast after cast with mirrolures. He was whacking them fast and furious along with his tournament partner Brian. Me, not so much. I fell behind quickly but later began to make up some ground on them once I figured out the cadence I needed to work the lures. Ed is a power fisherman. He is all about making as many casts as fast as possible. He said that we were going to the fish and not waiting on the fish. He said “sure live bait guys can be successful while waiting.” However, waiting on a fish to strike would be painful for this guy. Eddie, is a specialist. He knows his local speckled trout better than most in his region. Sure a lot of guys can catch speckled trout but Ed is the guy that is still catching when few others are successful. He said he will also target Flounder when the bite is good or when tournaments call for a slam type entry. So, not only is Eddie a speckled trout specialist he is more specifically a mirrolure casting, speckled trout catching guy.
The days following my Jacksonville journey, I had one of my top guys in town from Atlanta. Scott has been a regular of mine since 2015 and he brings one to as many as 8 other anglers with him to enjoy the diversity that Mobile Bay has to offer. Scott came down to the Gulf Shores area on his first trip with his family and he decided to book me for 3 days of fishing. The first day was an epic Big trout day. 4-6 lb speckled trout were eating every croaker we cast at the beach along Fort Morgan. Scott was hooked on Mobile Bay after the first day. Fast forward to this past week. I picked up Scott and his friend Brad at the house they rented on Dauphin Island and we headed into the northeast wind and began fishing Portersville Bay. The areas we fished in Portersville provided zero action. We moved to Grand Bay and found a few of Scott’s favorite kind of speckled trout, topwater speckled trout. We ended up bouncing from shallow area to shallow area throwing topwater, popping corks with both live and vudu shrimp. We picked up plenty of short speckled trout and a few white trout but overall not much to keep. I made a few phone calls and all Captains I spoke to seemed to have similar results.
We ended up making our way out into Mobile Bay where we ended up catching over a limit of 2lb speckled trout and a couple Spanish mackerel. All Mobile Bay fish bit on the falling tide with live shrimp under a slip cork. Interesting note, I used a 60lb fluorocarbon leader to reduce the number of cut lines from the Spanish and the extra leader did not slow our bite at all. The next day we had a stronger east wind and we began in Portersville again and once again feel short. We ventured into west Fowl river and the areas we fished were non productive. The wind was showing signs of letting up so we headed toward the Gulf. If you know Scott, loves cobia as much as Big trout. Our cobia efforts fell short. Literally, we caught one cobia, but it was too short to keep. We stopped at a rig 3 miles from shore and dropped some pogies on the legs to see if any cobia were nearby and we landed 12 snapper in about 20 minutes. The snapper were fun but unable to keep due to our reduced season. We ended our day in Mobile Bay catching speckled trout, spanish mackerel and even pompano on live shrimp under a slip cork.
The third and final day I had the guys meet me on the causeway. We fished free-lined shrimp and pogies to catch some nice speckled trout and oversized reds in Mobile River, then we went into the Mobile Tensaw Delta where we landed several slot reds on live shrimp under popping corks.
The fact that I was ready and able to provide a variety of fishing experiences within three days for the same group of guys is what I think sets me apart from the specialist guy. I attempt to provide the best opportunity for each guest. I love targeting Big trout and would do so everyday if I could, but I thoroughly enjoy providing a diverse experience."
Captain Patric Garmeson is very mobile running trips from Dauphin Island to Gulf Shores. Captain Patric has years of experience fishing our local waters and is sure to provide you and your family with a fun-filled, fish catching experience on the water.
Summary
Regardless of the forecasts, the avid anglers and boating enthusiasts will find a way to get their fix. Just a friendly reminder; have all your safety gear up to date, be safe and courteous and but most of all keep those rods bent!
If you are planning a vacation to the area and want to take advantage of great fishing, cruise the bay or islands, there are plenty of options for you. Special thanks to all the contributors for this report. We look forward to keeping you informed each week of what's happening on the water.
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