Best way to catch Spanish mackeral inshore

[KevinE]

I have caughten a few on semi-live shrimp behind a bullet weight. Any successful tips to catch these speedsters?

[sundown]

Biggest spanish I ever saw I caught on a semi live shrimp in a creek mouth over near Enconfina about this time of year. I wouldn't count on this being the way to catch em though. trolling a clarkspoon out around the marker line might get you a few hits..If you can put up with the grass. Better bet would be to go out to one of the reefs and throw jigs.. Some big ones out there this time of year and you might see them hitting the bait pods..They'll take a topwater then too.

[KevinE]

Interesting. I might have to give that a shot when I take my boat offshore on Saturday and Sunday. I'm going with a friend tomorrow and fishing the flats so i was trying to see if there were any techniques I should try out inshore.

[Harmsway]

Simple really. Any lure retrieved fast will tempt them if they are there. Don't pass up any nervous water. Some people chum them in. Recommend a wire leader.

[KevinE]

I might try a little chum in the water....but there are a lot of sharks out and about right now for some reason.

[bman]

Black swivel, 14" of single strand brown wire, and a small clarks spoon. I like the ones with the red bead on the top. '00" or "0" or "1" size.
The shot below is from a couple of years ago with my buddy Dave.
The bucket on the right side is full of spanish



All of them were caught trolling around the flats off Shell Point.

[spraywash]

Ditto what Bman said...trolling a clarks spoon (4-6 kts) is almost a sure bet...look for harassed bait pods too and troll around them.

[tallykenj]

Looks interesting and fun. I want to give this a try this weekend. What water depth should I focus on? I'm thinking about target the St. Marks west flats.

[Jumptrout51]

5 feet and deeper.

[What a mess]

I have done the spoon I also have done the bomb rush on a bait pod thats getting worked over and threw top water to much fun! A green grub on a jig try to out run them gotcha plug, bubble & straw rig works but the plugs are the most fun. Devils horse if they are fired up crystal minnow if the aren't on top.

[KevinE]

I caught two Spanish on shrimp chunks...yes pieces of shrimp.....a little suprising. One was 16 inches and the other was about 15.

We also caught two trout...one was 18 and one was 16.

[KevinE]

BTW, there are a lot of weeds in the flats right now. That might make it tough to troll.