The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) has approved changes to snook bag and size limits and harvest seasons.
New rules reduce the snook daily recreational bag limit from 2 fish per person to a one-fish daily limit on Florida’s Atlantic Coast. This makes it a one fish limit statewide.
Rules also change the 27-34 inch slot limit to 28-32 inches in Atlantic waters and 28-33 inches in Florida’s Gulf, Everglades National Park and Monroe County waters.
In addition, the rules add the first half of December and the month of February to the Dec. 15 – Jan. 31 and May – August closed harvest seasons for snook in the Gulf, Everglades and Monroe County. The Dec- Jan. 13 and June – August closed harvest seasons on the Atlantic waters will remain unchanged.
The rules also allow anglers to carry more than one cast net aboard a vessel while fishing for snook.
The new snook rules take effect in July and will be implemented when the snook harvest season reopens on Sept. 1st.
Fishing the ICW has been inconsistent so far this year. One day you go out and you’ll find fish than the next day nothing. This seems to be especially true when it comes to trout. It’s not like it has been in past years when you could depend on finding trout almost everywhere. I’ve also heard the same thing is true up in St. Augustine. I don’t know what has changed but I do have a couple of theories.
One is a possible natural cycle that the fish go through and maybe this is their year. Another idea I have is the warm winters we’ve had the last couple of years. Maybe the warmer winter water has put them out of balance from their normal habits. The last idea is the lack of rain over the last couple of years causing much higher salinity levels in water that is normally brackish. This could affect their breeding habits and where the young fry grow up. Who really knows, but I think they sound good.
There has been though, some good catches of flounder coming from the ICW. A party I had out this past week had 3 nice flatties in the 15” range. Other people have been getting them in the same range. Capt. Mike Vickers had one last week that tipped the scales at almost 6 lbs. There is also some flounder being caught in the surf and on the pier. Shrimp, mullet or mud minnows are all good baits for flounder.
Roy Mattson at Roy’s bait House reports that Joe Rickey went offshore for a 28” grouper, 3 – 21” red snapper and a 22” yellowtail snapper. Blake Allman fished the rocks around Matanzas inlet and had 4 pompano between 3 – 4 lbs, 11 good size whiting and 2 slot size reds.
Photo: Capt. Rob Ottlein caught and released this 24” snook. The fish was caught fly fishing with a topwater bubblehead fly.
New rules reduce the snook daily recreational bag limit from 2 fish per person to a one-fish daily limit on Florida’s Atlantic Coast. This makes it a one fish limit statewide.
Rules also change the 27-34 inch slot limit to 28-32 inches in Atlantic waters and 28-33 inches in Florida’s Gulf, Everglades National Park and Monroe County waters.
In addition, the rules add the first half of December and the month of February to the Dec. 15 – Jan. 31 and May – August closed harvest seasons for snook in the Gulf, Everglades and Monroe County. The Dec- Jan. 13 and June – August closed harvest seasons on the Atlantic waters will remain unchanged.
The rules also allow anglers to carry more than one cast net aboard a vessel while fishing for snook.
The new snook rules take effect in July and will be implemented when the snook harvest season reopens on Sept. 1st.
Fishing the ICW has been inconsistent so far this year. One day you go out and you’ll find fish than the next day nothing. This seems to be especially true when it comes to trout. It’s not like it has been in past years when you could depend on finding trout almost everywhere. I’ve also heard the same thing is true up in St. Augustine. I don’t know what has changed but I do have a couple of theories.
One is a possible natural cycle that the fish go through and maybe this is their year. Another idea I have is the warm winters we’ve had the last couple of years. Maybe the warmer winter water has put them out of balance from their normal habits. The last idea is the lack of rain over the last couple of years causing much higher salinity levels in water that is normally brackish. This could affect their breeding habits and where the young fry grow up. Who really knows, but I think they sound good.
There has been though, some good catches of flounder coming from the ICW. A party I had out this past week had 3 nice flatties in the 15” range. Other people have been getting them in the same range. Capt. Mike Vickers had one last week that tipped the scales at almost 6 lbs. There is also some flounder being caught in the surf and on the pier. Shrimp, mullet or mud minnows are all good baits for flounder.
Roy Mattson at Roy’s bait House reports that Joe Rickey went offshore for a 28” grouper, 3 – 21” red snapper and a 22” yellowtail snapper. Blake Allman fished the rocks around Matanzas inlet and had 4 pompano between 3 – 4 lbs, 11 good size whiting and 2 slot size reds.
Photo: Capt. Rob Ottlein caught and released this 24” snook. The fish was caught fly fishing with a topwater bubblehead fly.