# Not really what we had planned!!!!



## Lipz (Mar 19, 2013)

Most of the offshore anglers including myself were itching for the snapper season specially with a beautiful weather forecast, we had made plans to leave early get the limit and come back early, I guess we had set our expectations high and have not got well prepared, but few factors had affected the whole deal here, full moon during snapper spawning with the heat wave, so here is how things went for us…

Saturday, 18th

Set the alarm to 2:30, clean my self, got coffee, my brother and cousin show up at 3, got the routine check up done, got beer, frozen bait, snacks, tackle, more beer, more coffee and headed towards FWB, boat in the water by 4ish and headed towards destin, start to catch some pin fish at the bridge and docks, by 5 headed to the pass to look for cigs, we spent the next 2 hours almost to catch maybe 20 of them, they had a line with 50 boats or more made even before the bait man showed up. Anyway start heading SW about 5 miles start seeing fly fish, the waves were little sporty so I had to adjust the course and instead going to the edge we went to the starfish along another 20 boats, got there tried the cheapanoc first, good show but nothing, tried the spots around and managed to catch a black snapper, good so from there we stoped in every spot that nobody were fishing in it (not many) but still about 12 or so until we get to the edge, and there was few boats that saw us fishing the spot and still getting really close trying to fish the same spot, really not polite but we were not catching s…t anyway, so I told them “you can have it we are leaving” in one of those spots we caught one 30” king on the jig and one mahi that ate a whole sardine on the fly line, that bastard had a whole fly fish on its belly I found out later cleaning the fish. So was almost 11 and we had been in the water for almost 7 hours with one mahi and one black snapper and half the live bait gone, so decided to high speed the edge, did that while eating lunch and hydrating with more nattys, by noon reeled them in and put 2 guys on the chicken rig and one on live bait over natural bottom, depth of 190ish 83 degrees, started catching mingos, ajs, short grouper and few short snappers and occasionally a keeper, and slowly the bite was improving and we kept moving around, we did not limit on anything, probably fished over 50 spots, drank tons of nattys, and worked our b..ts off, but after reading reports and calling few people I think we produce good since we only fished public spots and not many live bait available. After the hard work Saturday stayed home on Sunday to clean the boat, tackle and organizing, grilled some mahi and ate some tacos, I highly recommend the Cajun 2 step, you can find them now at the Walmart, that’s money dude!


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## Boat-Dude (Sep 24, 2011)

Nice write up dude, don't be hard on yourself. A ton of people including myself struggles on the snapper opener. I had about 40 live baits and 80% got slammed by AJ's or sharked. I just couldn't get it together. Wife saved the day with a 30" snap on a drift. So you guys did good and got meat in the box!!


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## Lipz (Mar 19, 2013)

Boat-Dude said:


> Nice write up dude, don't be hard on yourself. A ton of people including myself struggles on the snapper opener. I had about 40 live baits and 80% got slammed by AJ's or sharked. I just couldn't get it together. Wife saved the day with a 30" snap on a drift. So you guys did good and got meat in the box!!


Thanks! I normally set my speciations we above the possible, and my plan were to leave early and come back early due the high volume of boats in the ramp and traffic, but it was much harder then what I thought lol so we had to keep going deeper looking for cooler water and less pressure. I stilll
Got a lot to learn but drives me crazy when I can’t figure something and the only fish we can target successfully is mingo so far, I really need to learn to use my sonar like adjust the settings and also to read it, most of what I know I have learned here and on videos online, I am very thankful for all of you here that spend the time here sharing the expertise.


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## Boat-Dude (Sep 24, 2011)

I have learned a lot on here and youtube. I fished the pier forever and finally got a boat a few years ago. It's embarrassing to say but I never used a bottom machine or GPS before. I sense you have the desire to learn. Have fun with it.


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## SurfRidr (Apr 24, 2012)

Nice job putting in the work, you guys got a pretty decent haul, considering. We didn't find hardly any live bait, but managed a 3-person limit on opening day using squid, brined frozen shrimp, and cut pieces of fresh ruby reds. We went again Sunday and it was a tough day, we fought through the morning NE slop and it settled down mid day; the bite was slow for snapper. Of course we got some stud-sized triggers we had to throw back, managed 3 red snapper, an 18-inch lane snapper, and a 17-inch mangrove, but it took us all day to do it.


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## Lipz (Mar 19, 2013)

Boat-Dude said:


> I have learned a lot on here and youtube. I fished the pier forever and finally got a boat a few years ago. It's embarrassing to say but I never used a bottom machine or GPS before. I sense you have the desire to learn. Have fun with it.


Same here dude, I had only fished fresh water water until I moved here 15 years ago and started offshore about 8 or so years ago, the way I see offshore fishing takes lots of Investemnts of money and time, and results will come with time and some time we want it now lol


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## Lipz (Mar 19, 2013)

SurfRidr said:


> Nice job putting in the work, you guys got a pretty decent haul, considering. We didn't find hardly any live bait, but managed a 3-person limit on opening day using squid, brined frozen shrimp, and cut pieces of fresh ruby reds. We went again Sunday and it was a tough day, we fought through the morning NE slop and it settled down mid day; the bite was slow for snapper. Of course we got some stud-sized triggers we had to throw back, managed 3 red snapper, an 18-inch lane snapper, and a 17-inch mangrove, but it took us all day to do it.


it has been tough, I heard That a lot. We had to go deeper then planned otherwise would be no red snapper lol, we did pretty good just not as quick and easy as planned, and yes without good live bait it is hard, we will try again next weekend hopefully bait will be easier to find and fish more active


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## Corpsman (Oct 3, 2007)

We caught a mess of beeliners, but no reds. What's a cheapanoc?


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## Lipz (Mar 19, 2013)

Corpsman said:


> We caught a mess of beeliners, but no reds. What's a cheapanoc?


It is the starfish reef, I will send the coordinates shortly


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## Lipz (Mar 19, 2013)




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## Lipz (Mar 19, 2013)

Corpsman said:


> We caught a mess of beeliners, but no reds. What's a cheapanoc?


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## jwilson1978 (Mar 23, 2021)

Lipz said:


> Most of the offshore anglers including myself were itching for the snapper season specially with a beautiful weather forecast, we had made plans to leave early get the limit and come back early, I guess we had set our expectations high and have not got well prepared, but few factors had affected the whole deal here, full moon during snapper spawning with the heat wave, so here is how things went for us…
> 
> Saturday, 18th
> 
> ...


Looks damn good for conditions. Full moons are tough especially for bottom fish in first part of the day. And it seems to get worse the deeper you fish.


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## Lipz (Mar 19, 2013)

jwilson1978 said:


> Looks damn good for conditions. Full moons are tough especially for bottom fish in first part of the day. And it seems to get worse the deeper you fish.


i agree, we had to put in hard work And much more time using everything we had available, we left home 3:30 and got back 7:30, next time fishing full moon I will not leave early, 90% of the fish was caught in the afternoon


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## Xpac (Jun 22, 2011)

Looks like the hard work payed off. That’s a great mess of fish! It’s tough to pass up an opportunity to fish even with a full moon. Nice work!


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## Lipz (Mar 19, 2013)

Xpac said:


> Looks like the hard work payed off. That’s a great mess of fish! It’s tough to pass up an opportunity to fish even with a full moon. Nice work!


i agreee, sometimes we get spoiled on fishing trip and expect every trip to be done quick and easy lol


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## sws763 (10 mo ago)

Awesome report and nice haul! It seems like the bite has been slow so far. Last season was much easier to limit for sure.


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## Lipz (Mar 19, 2013)

sws763 said:


> Awesome report and nice haul! It seems like the bite has been slow so far. Last season was much easier to limit for sure.


Thanks. Yes, It has been very slow, let’s hope was only the full moon, we will know more about in couple weeks.


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## OutsmartedAgain (Oct 12, 2018)

Red snapper spawn on the june and july full moon, so I imagine it throws an even bigger wrench into the equation than the run of the mill full moon. Looks like you did a lot better than most!


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## Boat-Dude (Sep 24, 2011)

OutsmartedAgain said:


> Red snapper spawn on the june and july full moon, so I imagine it throws an even bigger wrench into the equation than the run of the mill full moon. Looks like you did a lot better than most!


Why is Red Snapper season open then?


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## jwilson1978 (Mar 23, 2021)

OutsmartedAgain said:


> Red snapper spawn on the june and july full moon, so I imagine it throws an even bigger wrench into the equation than the run of the mill full moon. Looks like you did a lot better than most!


Well there’s something that never clicked. I do know a lot of fish don’t like to bite when there spawning so something that’s interesting


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## jwilson1978 (Mar 23, 2021)

Boat-Dude said:


> Why is Red Snapper season open then?


Tourist season


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## Boat-Dude (Sep 24, 2011)

jwilson1978 said:


> Tourist season


Seriously?


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## jwilson1978 (Mar 23, 2021)

Boat-Dude said:


> Seriously?


Hell I don’t know just seems right why else. We all know the Government knows what’s best for fish populations. They for sure don’t worry about how much money will be lost lol . I mean when are all the seasons open. It’s not in the off season


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## MrFish (Aug 21, 2009)

That's exactly why.


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## Boat-Dude (Sep 24, 2011)

Sad, the way I filet fish I don't see the contents of the fish, i cut over the rib cage.. If I saw row in these red snapper that is horrible.


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## Lipz (Mar 19, 2013)

OutsmartedAgain said:


> Red snapper spawn on the june and july full moon, so I imagine it throws an even bigger wrench into the equation than the run of the mill full moon. Looks like you did a lot better than most!


Yes and we took that in consideration when we planned the trip, but from my researches they spawn in the sand so basically off the wrecks or natural habitat, we fished with 30 lb fluorocarbon leader 4/0 hook with live bait, Bonita strips, frozen bait and digging, I mean was much tougher then what we thought so from being 6 hours trip max ended up being 14 hours lol, but in the end the hard work paid off…


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## Lipz (Mar 19, 2013)

Boat-Dude said:


> Sad, the way I filet fish I don't see the contents of the fish, i cut over the rib cage.. If I saw row in these red snapper that is horrible.


I fillet mines too, but the bigger fish I always do a little “inspection” lol all the red snappers had eggs in them, lotta of them had a small sardine in their belly too, the mahi had a whole fly fish in its belly and ate a big sardine on the fly line.


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## jwilson1978 (Mar 23, 2021)

Lipz said:


> I fillet mines too, but the bigger fish I always do a little “inspection” lol all the red snappers had eggs in them, lotta of them had a small sardine in their belly too, the mahi had a whole fly fish in its belly and ate a big sardine on the fly line.


I like to check out the insides to you will find some wild stuff in there sometimes. And for anyone that don't know. those bigger fish after you filet them get the guts out and grill that carcass. The collagen in the bones wicks out and in to the meat. Best fish of what ever it is you will ever have.


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