Beach Fishing With Paul Sperco Palm Beach/Martin County Area

The surf action has been pretty consistent the last couple of days. The pompano bite has been excellent when you can find the clean water but most of this activity has been catch and release due to the abundance of undersized fish. Randy and I fished at Stuart Beach on Sunday and all of the pompano we caught were released but we managed to put a nice catch together of big whiting. Bluefish, ladyfish, and some jacks were the other species we had on our catch list. Today, Monday , I fished with the Treasure Coast fly fishing "guru", Jeff Smith. All of you anglers that know Jeff might find it hard to believe that he is pretty darn good at handling a 12 foot surf rod and a 7500 Penn Spinfisher Longcast reel because you probably have only seen him with a fly rod in his arsenal. We managed to catch around 20 pompano with only one keeper to show for it. We had constant action with pompano, bluefish, whiting ,and a few jacks. The pompano catch would have been better but the sharks showed up in big numbers after the tide turned this morning. EZ Flea , Yellow Crab, and Pink Shrimp Fishbites accounted for most of the fish. We also got some bites today on frozen sand fleas that were tipped with EZ Flea Fishbites. The water up near Fort Pierce Inlet today was perfect and I am sure if the sharks had not shown up our catch would have been much better. Looking at the webcam this afternoon the water looks good on the south end of Hutchinson Island also so I am sure there are fish along most of our beaches. I watched a couple of anglers fishing just north of me today and unfortunately they did not have much success. I always mention the fact that you have to be able to reach the pompano when you are targeting them so the 7 foot rod and reel combos just do not have the ability to put your bait where it belongs. There are two main reasons folks are not successful at consistently catching pompano. One, you are fishing in off colored water and Two, you are not reaching them . I am going to do a couple of posts and videos in the near future focusing on pompano tackle and explaining how and why having the right gear will put you in the game.