Report for Destin, Florida - Nearshore

Capt. Larry Pentel
May 19, 2002
Destin - Saltwater Fishing Report

It's almost June and we've got a bona-fide cold front blowin' through. It was 53 degrees this AM when I launched the boat and supposed to be even cooler tonight! Where is all this global warming at? The temperature doesn' really matter that much but this 25 knot wind sure puts a hurt on my fishing. I managed to convince my folks the last 2 days that it wasn't going to be fun. No point in going when all you can do is hang on. The wind has made me cancel half my trips this month. This being honest is starting to interfere with the bank balance.

On the bright side the fish don't seem to mind at all. Gulf fishing continues to be excellent with Red Snappers still the front and center species. We've been able to limit out on most of even the 4 hour trips with a box full fine bright red dinners. Before all this wind I even found a school of Amberjacks up in close with some more than legal ones in it. I think we added a 10lb or better AJ or two to the box on 5 trips last week. Lots of shorts for the folks that just want to sportfish with lighter tackle too.

The only day I've tried to mackeral fish lately was Friday. Wether they are thick or we were just lucky I don't know but we had a limit of kings and a big spanish in less than 2 hours.Then went and added a few snappers and some trigs for good measure. Lots of triggers around also. If I get a party that wants to fish for 'em for a few hours I believe we could fill the box. Everybody wants snappers tho-.

I ran a bay trip last week for the first time in a while. The wind was blowin' 20+ knots due East and the Gulf was WAY to rough. Folks just wanted to fish though and we went and bounced around the bay some. We had several trout on that my folks got a little too exited with and broke off the 8# line. We managed to boat 3 nice trout over 20 inches and several smaller ones in our 4 hours along with 10 blue fish and the ever present catfishes. Not bad for the conditions we had, I imagine with a pretty day the trout bite is right good.

Boy, I guess I'll dig out my sweats from the back of the closet and hope the wind dies down for tomorrow. Brrr.

Capt. Larry Pentel

More Fishing Reports:

• All Reports by Capt. Larry Pentel
• Destin Fishing Reports
• Panhandle and Big Bend (Suwannee to Pensacola) Reports
• Florida Fishing Reports
• Browse All Fishing Reports