Outdoors

Captain's Corner

By DAVE ZALEWSKI
Published October 16, 2007

What's hot: The largest Spanish mackerel we have caught in years can be found on the artificial reefs of St. Pete Beach, Treasure Island and Madeira Beach. Paying close attention to your depth finder will reveal the various types of structure ranging from a large barge to military tanks to large piles of concrete rubble that have been placed on these sites. The baitfish that these spotted speedsters are feeding on have been holding tight to the structure. Blind trolling will produce some fish, but to really succeed, it is necessary to place your spoons and planers directly over the structure.

Tackle: For average-sized mackerel, we usually deploy No. 0 or No. 11 spoons behind No. 1 or No. 2 planers trolled at 6 knots. The fish are so large that using spoons and plugs for kingfish are proving more effective than the smaller baits. Color has made a difference, with blue and gold producing the most strikes.

Tip: Obtaining and studying one of the artificial reef brochures will reveal many useful GPS numbers for the reefs and some of the structure, such as the barges and tanks. The reef number will be for the old center buoy for the reef. These reefs extended about 1,000 feet to the north and south from the center and were about 600 feet wide.

[Last modified October 15, 2007, 23:11:46]