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The gulf coast of Florida offers some of the best grouper fishing around. The Gulf has fairly calm water most of the year (except for our new 11 month recent hurricane season). The gear is pretty simple: a fairly stout rod, I say fairly stout because you don’t want your rod too stiff because this will effect the action it has on the bait…more on this later. I use 40lb line on the reel with a 100lb shock leader, and about an 8/0 hook. I like to use live bait for grouper fishing but some prefer jigs, spoons, and even heavy grade trolling lures.

After gear, guests, and boat are ready we need to catch some bait. I like to use the “junk” fish that you catch when bottom fishing with smaller rigs. Blue runners, sand perch, lizard fish, etc… Grouper are not real picky eaters when it comes to live bait. Yes, they do have favorites like anything else that eats, but the fish mentioned above will work great. I start my day with a piece of a large squid, about the size of you open hand is usually enough. I like to use large squid because it is tougher and stays on the hook better. Check you local fish market for availability.

We head out and stop around the 45’ area and start looking for our bait. Most of the time there are no clear signs of where the bait is, you just have to keep trying till you have some luck. The bait we are looking for is holding on the bottom most of the time unless you can find some sardines in the area, then try a Sabaki rig or something similar. Cut your squid into small strips and send it to the bottom and see if any small bait fish are going cooperate with your plans. Unless you have a favorite area to catch bait, you might have to move around till you start getting bites. We usually move about 300-500 feet each move till the bait starts biting.

After you get a couple dozen baitfish in the livewell head on out to your fishing area. Ours is around the 100 foot mark and is a series of GPS marks in a 3-5 mile square area. If we don’t get a bite in 20-30 minutes or so we will move on to another GPS mark in the area, (and no, I won’t give you my GPS #’s)…sorry!

This article is continued in part II.

You can read more about fishing techniques, submit your fishing photos, check out some tackle classified ads, or just look through our fishing forums at saltwater-angler.com

Thanks for reading!

Bluewater

Carp fishing is a rather enjoyable past-time as these fish are very smart and aren’t so easily persuaded to take the bait. Nonetheless, with some trickery, you can entice carp and dupe them into being caught. What follows are just a few tips to help you when fishing for carp:-

• Take fishmeal boilies in the finer weather (summer and autumn), and try your luck with half-half mixes or birdfood bait in the winter and spring seasons
• Add a lot of salt to particle baits, particularly the cooked types such as maize, maple peas and chick peas. The carp love salty food. As a rough guide, mix one tablespoon of salt to 5 litres dry particles. These are also cost-effective and will save you money on baits!
• Try adding spicy chillies to particle baits. The carp fish appear to savour that fiery sensation from the spices. Roughly, add two tablespoons to 5 litres of particles.
• Use contrasting particles or pellet sizes in a spod mixture. This aids in disorientating the carp, and also gives you the selection to use several sizes on the hook.
• Add high sources of vitamin C into your bait. Stir your method with orange juice and not water from the lake. You can also experiment with soaking fresh boilies in fruit juice in order to give that distinct flavour.
• If you are nervous about supplying too much food to the “swim”, then use breadcrumb groundbait with merely the attractants included, but without all the particle baits included. This tempts the carp without filling them up.
• Lastly, make sure you have the right fishing gear with you. Research what you should bring online. You can find all kinds of things online, such as muddy water bobbins - and be sure to enjoy the experience!

Writer Clinton J Veasey tells you how to find the right carp fishing tackle

Fishing is one of the most populat sports in the UK. A lot of people go on fishing trips regularly throughout the year. One of the most important things that you’ll need to buy is carp tackle and you should find a range of options online and in stores.

First things first, if you’re interested in buying carp tackle, you’ll have a few things to think about. You’ll have to consider a budget because knowing how much to spend is important. It’s quite easy to work this out as long as you do your research.

Go to your favourite search engine, whether it’s Google or somewhere else, and type in products that you’re looking for. You should also have a pen and paper with you so that you can write down the prices as you go. Once you have a list of prices you should easily be able to work out a realistic budget.

Make sure that you have a pen and paper with you and make a note of the deals you see as you browse the web. You should also consider quality while you’re browsing because you want to ensure that the products you buy aren’t low quality and that they’ll last a few years at least.

It can be quite tempting to opt for the lowest prices but keep quality in mind. You may also want to consider heading into your local fishing store to see what they have on offer. However, only do this once you’ve got a good idea of what’s available online.

Buying online will give you access to a much larger range of products and usually the prices are better as well. Just make sure that you prioritise buying online because it’s so much easier to get good deals when compared with shopping on the high street.

Overall, as long as you do your research, buying carp tackle should be easy. It’s simple to find offers online but you’ll have to ensure that you keep your wits about you and look out for deals that could be too good to be true. Keep a pen and paper with you when you’re browsing online so that you can make a note of the offer that you like the look of.