I went to see some friends in Florida and do some fishing. I did both fresh water and salt water and both had great results. I saw alot of peacock bass but only managed to hook 1. The highlight of the freshwater action was a 24" largemouth. We later went out on the ocean for some tarpon and snook. The snook fishing was off the charts! among the ones I caught, 2 were over 20 pounds with the biggest being 42" 27 pounds. I also hooked into 3 tarpon and all got away after fighting them for a while. Man can they fight! watching them explode out of the water is one of the neatest things I’ve ever seen. I believe this is going to become a tradition. Here are a few pics.
Funny you mention FL. I am moving from Salt Lake to Jacksonville at the end of the month.
Coming from NY finding Bass fishing in UTAH anywhere near as good is hard to find. Believe me… man I have traveled far just this past month alone.
I hate to leave Utah bass fishing just as I got use to it. But hey… going pro in utah only has 2 levels… not and no.
Nice pics BTW. Was that Largemouth in a random pond or swamp? Where did you catch the peacock? My wife needs to know.
Anyone interested in hunting some LRG M bass in the next two weeks PM me.
All the fish I caught where in the Ft Lauderdale area.. Total urban fishing. quite literally, if you see any water, canals, ponds, etc, there are fish in them. Peacocks are everywhere in that area and Miami. I saw tons of them. I had better luck catching them last year. They don’t have the size like brazil, but they put up a hard fight.
I believe south Florida is the best place to wet a line in the U.S. I lived in Ft. Lauderdale and Miami for a brief period about 9 years ago and caught a ton of fish. I would go fishing in the canals and ponds around my apartment and always got into largemouth and peacock bass.
The tarpon and snook will swim up the canals. You can catch them several miles inland from the ocean. I often would hook up on a 20+ pound tarpon while fishing for largemouth, but they always snapped my 8 pound test line (Tarpon are my favorite saltwater species). Every now and then we would see gators in the canals or water moccasins. I heard report that dolphins and manatees will swim up the canals too. I also remember fishing off a pier one time and watching a 4-5 foot barracuda swim around all the tourists in the water. They had no idea that fish was around.
By the way, when I lived in Florida the only place you coud find peacock bass was south of West Palm Beach county, which is 6-7 hours from Jacksonville. I was told it was too cold up in northern Florida for them.
I would love to settle down out there, I just have to convince my wife that it is not so bad. I’ll have to try and dig up some of the pics of the peacock bass and post them.
I jst got back from miami last week and i have a great incentive for your wife to move down there right now. You can actually buy a a home that used to be $350k for about 180k to $200k. And you can go into any canal down there and catch peacocks and other critters.[;)] Plus you have the ocean you can go out on a fishing trip for uner $40 for 4 hours and catch the same fish as a $500 guided trip.
I just got back from a week in Fernandina Beach (Amelia Island) which is 30 minutes from Jacksonville. My wife and I spent two days fishing for reds, trout, and ladyfish. There were a lot of storms coming through so there was a lot of freshwater in the system but still a lot of fun on topwater baits.
We spent one day offshore for kings, cuda, grouper, red snapper, cobia, and amberjack. We caught a bunch of huge red snapper and good sized grouper and some enormous cobia and amberjack.
Tarpon will be moving into that area in July through September if you are interested.
Great photos, thanks for posting them. Those snook are monsters!
My wife is from Florida and we go to Sanibel Island Florida every year. It is a paradise up there. There is a fishing pier where you can catch mackerel, grouper, ladyfish, and dozens of other fish. If you have the right equipment to handle it you can also catch sharks, stingrays, goliath grouper, snook, and redrish all from shore!
I spent some time at the pier but also walking the pristine beaches sight fishing for Snook. I also had my dad fly in and we did a few charters to learn the ropes of Tarpon fishing and one to learn the “honey holes” One day we caught 100 snook 50 yards off the beach. My arm was sore for 2 days. The fish ranged from 3-20 pounds and surprisingly some of the smaller ones really fought hard and nearly kicked my butt.
My wife wants to move to Florida someday and while I would miss my Utah streams, Florida would definitely not be a downgrade in the fishing department.