Fishing Report: September 25, 2020

You’ll find amberjack action offshore

Every Friday morning, Captain Dylan Hubbard of Hubbard's Marina joins Good Day to fill viewers in on his fishing forecast as we head into the weekend. Here is his fishing report for September 25, 2020.

MADEIRA BEACH, Fla. - Every Friday morning, Captain Dylan Hubbard of Hubbard's Marina joins Good Day to fill viewers in on his fishing forecast as we head into the weekend.

Here is his fishing report for September 25, 2020.

Inshore

We are still dealing with the weather around the area, but that has not slowed down the fish too badly. We are coming up on a full moon, so the tides have been moving pretty good lately and that means the fish are ready to eat.

We had a good start to last weekend before weather went bad and now it is clearing up the second half of this week and shaping-up for a beautiful weekend. 

The redfish are excited around the entire area! We are catching lots of redfish around the passes at night. During the day, plenty of them are found around the grass flats, mangrove shorelines, oyster bars and more. There's lots of redfish action is picking up throughout the Bay Area right now.

During the day, they are more towards the bottom in deeper areas or looking for shaded areas hitting cut bait most often. During the night, early morning, and closer to dusk, we are seeing more active fish moving around chasing live baits and lures. Soft plastic paddle tails are a great option for the redfish in almost any situation where they are actively feeding. We are even seeing them hit the flairhawk style lures that the snook love in the passes. 

Snook are still biting well too but have slowed down and spread out more lately. During the night, in the passes, we are not seeing huge congregations of aggressive fish like we had through the summer, but there are still a few fish around. During the day there’s still a handful of juvenile fish out on the beaches, and the occasional big girl, but most of the snook have moved back off the beaches, out of the passes and headed back into the bay.

As the water cools, they drift more towards the upper bay and to the mouths of rivers and bayous. It's where they can count on that more accountable water temperatures and that dark bay mud bottom that radiates heat during the day to keep them from ‘freezing’ when water temperatures drop around those cold fronts of the winter.

This migration up into the bay has definitely started, and each cold front will push more fish to these areas and out of the passes and off the beaches. 

Trout action has been a little slower due to weather, but those able to get out there to the flats found 'em biting well around the edges of the flats and around the mangroves. The lower tides concentrate these guys around those potholes on or adjacent to the flats and has really produced some good catches of trout on soft plastics, live shrimp, or live white baits. 

Mangrove snapper fishing is still going well around the structures of the area. We are seeing a lot of these guys around the structures biting small pieces of shrimp or white bait around docks, bridges, piers, jetties, or rock piles. The bridges of Tampa Bay and local fishing piers are great options to target the mangroves. 

Near shore and Offshore

Due to weather, fishing near shore and offshore has been tricky to access. However, we have gotten lucky at the start of last weekend and towards the end of this week.

We had a great Saturday bite last weekend, right before the weather went bad Sunday. The red grouper were jumping in the boat on the Flying HUB 2 private fishing charter that fished around 110 to 150 feet of water. This area should be producing awesome fishing this coming weekend into the start of the coming week while we have a little bit of a weather window.

Plus, around that same depth, the lane snapper, big vermillions and mangrove snapper are biting well too. You have a chance for some kingfish on the flat line too. 

In closer, around 70 to 100 feet of water the HUB had a great trip on lane snapper, some vermillion, a few mangroves and a handful of red grouper. Closer to shore, in this near shore range, we are still catching the red grouper, but they get bigger and more prolific a little deeper past around 100 to 110 feet of water.

We're seeing some mackerel getting more aggressive and prolific near shore and even picked up a few small kingfish. Both are great signs that the ‘fall’ kingfish and mackerel run is just around the corner as the water temperatures get right. 

Out deeper, around 150 to 170 feet, and beyond to 250 feet, we are seeing some great amberjack action, better chances at some fat gag grouper, and some big red grouper are out there too with a steady mangrove bite and the biggest vermillions and some nice porgies.

Plus, out here is where you have a shot for wahoo along with better chances at kingfish right now. 

We're hoping the weather will start to calm a bit now so we can get back after it near shore and offshore ranges. The hogfish bite is going to pick up anytime, gags will start moving in and those kingfish and mackerel in big numbers are not too far away near shore!

It's an exciting time of year for sure, but we all must pay extremely close attention to the weather before your trip, the night before and the morning of and again while out there if you can because this time of the year the weather can change ridiculously quickly. It can be dangerous, especially with cooling water temperatures. 

For more information from Hubbard’s Marina, head over to their website.