All the stars were aligned for targeting kingfish, Spanish mackerel and Bonita over the past seven days. Perfect water temperature and an easterly wind flow cleaned the water up right along the beach attracting schools of pilchards, threadfins and glass minnows.
Cast netting live pilchards just outside the swash channel on the beach will give you all the live bait you should need to fire the fish up. Natural hard bottom areas within a mile from shore serve as migratory highways for these fish. Sand key, Redington, and Blind Pass have good bottom mixed with small ledges that attract baitfish.
Anchoring and chumming the waters with a combination of a quality chum block, cut pilchards, as well as tossing handfuls of live pilchards will draw the fish to your boat. Typically, kingfish tackle would consist of a conventional reel that can hold at least 300 yards of 20-to 25-pound test and matching rod with light tip. But there’s nothing saying that you can’t use the same tackle that you would use inshore on the flats. Just make sure that your reels have a couple of hundred yards of 20 pound braid. For the wire leader rig I like to use a 1/0 long shank hook and about 18 inches of #4 coffee colored wire connected to a small swivel. Tying a small buoy or life jacket to your anchor rope will allow you to break away from your anchor quickly in case a big fish is hooked or gets wrapped around a crab trap.
A Thanksgiving Day front will mess things up for a couple of days but as long as it moves through quickly we should have east winds by Sunday. 69 to 72 degrees is the temperature zone you want to look for. So if the near-shore waters cool down much below that you’ll have to go farther offshore to find some warmer water.
Until Next Week – get bent!
Capt. Wallerstein can be reached at capt.tyson@hotmail.com. To get a fish photo in the paper, send the photo along with your name, when and where it was caught to editorial@TBNweekly.com or mail it to Tampa Bay Newspapers, 9911 Seminole Blvd., Seminole, FL 33772.
