Marco Island, Ft. Myers & Boca Grande

Get Ready! Now is the time to get prepared for the fall fishing explosion. Fall is my favorite time of year to fish because the weather is good almost all the time and you can catch everything that swims. Snook, redfish, tarpon, trout, tripletail, mackerel, snapper, grouper, and jacks make a showing this time of year. The show hasn't started yet but all the players are in place. Tarpon are following the bait schools south, snook are migrating into the backcountry, redfish are starting to school, and everything else is waiting for the first cool spell to kick everything off. Bait is everywhere and thick. Small sardines are all along the beach and the farther you go offshore the larger they get. Anytime now the explosions will start and you'll find everything from kingfish to tarpon and sharks balling the bait schools. Look for explosions but birds will give away the locations from much farther out. At the moment snook fishing is the best bet. Fair numbers of snook are hitting sardines off the 10,000 Islands. We had weak tides around labor Day weekend but we still mangaed a half dozen snook each day. To catch the slot fish you'll need to catch 4-6 inch sardines or herring. The smaller baits off the beaches just aren't attracting the bigger snook. We found good numbers of tarpon and Bonito moving south off the beaches of Lee County and very large sharks and jack crevelle hitting herring in Charlotte Harbor. Trout, redfish, grouper and spanish mackerel also made it into the fishing log last week. The key is to find birds. The birds are following the bait waiting to catch the injured sardines or herring that the tarpon, bonito, mackerel, jacks or sharks let get away. The weather is usually great this time of year and the large crowds are gone and the fishing is excellent so now is a great time fish get a fishing trip in Good Luck! Capt. Scott Hughes Blackwater Charters 941-628-4247 cell