SW FL-Bonita Beach: hogfish, sheepshead, snapper

[fishbuster]

On Wednesday, 1/23, after several days of cancelled trips, due to weather conditions, I finally got back out with Bob Carter and friend, Harvey. Using shrimp in 32 feet of water out of New Pass, we caught three hogfish, two of which were keeper size. We also kept two (out of a dozen) keeper-sized sheepshead and released the rest, along with keeper-sized mangrove snapper, an 18 inch bluefish, and gag grouper shorts to 20 inches. Bob and Harvey had three bigger gags hooked over the course of the morning, but they buried in the rocks and broke off.

Thursday morning, I headed out in heavy fog, thankful for radar, with Ron Musick and friend Dick. We fished about 17 miles west of New Pass. We caught four hogfish but only one was a keeper at 15 inches so we released the other three along with lots of gag grouper shorts to 20 inches and red grouper to 19 inches. We also caught fourteen keeper mangrove snapper and a mess of whitebone porgies.

The photo shown is of angler Terry Hopkins with a hogfish, caught on shrimp on a recent offshore trip.