Hog Fishin In The Bay!!!!

If you have the patience to hunt these guys down, I will offer up the same great strategy that seems to work for me: To start off, I utilize medium lite to medium size fishing rods- and our “weapons of choice” are the green stick made by Kris green these custom fishing can be purchased at ST. Pete Fishing Outfitters. I prefer a 10-15lb rod rating, but you can go with what you will have the most confidence in. As usual, the line of choice 15lb Braid attached to a 20lb fluorocarbon leader. What I feel is the most critical component of my setup is the use a 1/4oz Mission Fishin jig-head. Now that we talked about the setup, let’s get to how to find them. I’m going to suggest to you to search around the Skyway area for the natural bottom- there’s no need to look for the biggest rock pile. I tend to have my biggest rate of success when I fish the beginnings & ends of each tide. When fishing these areas and using this type of rig, you will also hook up with a fair amount of Mangrove Snapper and Key West Grunts. The water depth I am looking to fish is in is 25-30ft. Save yourself some of your hard earned money: There is no need to buy the biggest shrimp at eh bait shop to catch these guys. Regular or Hand Picked shrimp work just fine for this application, but make sure you bring plenty of them. As a rule of thumb, I typically make sure to bring 15 dozen shrimp for my clients when I’m running a 4 hour charter. 4 thST bait and tackle and Mitch's bait and tackle always has great looking shrimp! So when you’re out there hoggin’ try to bring a 4/0 reel lined with 80lb matched with a stout rod. You’re going to want to drop a 3-5oz sinker to bottom (depending on current) with a dead bait to the bottom. My personal favorite here is to have a butterflied Key West grunt attached to the business end. Make sure you lock the drag down and then simply set it in a rod holder. You just may happen to pull up a nice Red Grouper or a possibly a nice Gag Grouper ( If you put these tips to use and you’ll set yourself up for some great cold weather fishing & some of the best tasting fish you can get!!