UTERTo tell a spotted seatrout from a weakfish, look at the spots. A spotted seatrout, the speckled trout, has bold, round black spots on its back that carry onto the dorsal fins and the tail. A weakfish, the gray trout, has small, irregular spots lined up in wavy diagonal rows on its upper sides, and its fins are plain. Sand and silver seatrout have no bold spots at all. Sand seatrout are pale tan, and silver seatrout are small and silvery.
All four are seatrouts in the genus Cynoscion, drum-family fish with soft mouths and a pair of large canine teeth at the tip of the upper jaw. None of them is a true trout.
Quick-ID table
| Feature | Spotted seatrout | Weakfish | Sand seatrout | Silver seatrout |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Spots | Bold, round black spots on the back, running onto the dorsal fins and tail | Small, irregular dark spots in wavy diagonal lines on the upper sides | None | None, or faint rows on the upper sides |
| Back color | Dark gray or green | Dark olive or blue-green | Pale tan to yellowish | Grayish |
| Fins | Spotted dorsal and tail | Yellowish pelvic and anal fins | Pale | Pale yellow, with a darker dusky dorsal |
| Tail | Spotted | Not boldly spotted | Plain | Lower half longer than upper half |
| Other | Two large canines in the upper jaw | Two large canines; black-tipped tongue | Yellow inside the mouth; 10 to 12 soft anal rays | Large eyes, short snout |
| Typical size (FWC) | Commonly about 14 inches; up to 39 inches and 17 lb | Commonly up to about 20 inches | Usually under 15 inches, about 1 lb | Usually under 10 inches |
| Range | Gulf and Atlantic coasts | Atlantic, from Nova Scotia to Florida; mostly absent from the Gulf | Gulf; rare on the Atlantic side | Both Florida coasts, mostly offshore over sand |
| Habitat | Seagrass flats, sand holes, channel edges | Surf, inlets, bays and estuaries in the warm months; offshore in winter | Sandy bottoms of bays and the near-shore Gulf | Offshore sand and sandy mud; bays in the colder months |
Features are from FWC's seatrout profiles. The weakfish range is from Fishes of Texas.
The features in detail
Spots on the fins: the fast check
Lift the dorsal fin and look at the tail. If the black spots carry onto the fins, it's a spotted seatrout. A weakfish's spots are small and run in diagonal wavy lines along the back and upper sides. They don't make a polka-dot pattern, and they don't reach the tail. In bright sun a weakfish's spots can almost disappear, so shoot it in shade.
Sand seatrout: no spots, yellow mouth
A pale, tan seatrout with no dark spots is a sand seatrout, which Texans call a sand trout. FWC lists a yellow mouth interior and 10 to 12 soft anal rays. It's a Gulf fish, schooling over sand bottoms in bays and the near-shore Gulf, and FWC calls it rare in the Atlantic.
Silver seatrout: small and long-bottomed
The silver seatrout is the smallest of the four, usually under 10 inches. It has big eyes, a short snout and a tail whose lower half is longer than the upper. It lives mostly offshore over sand, so anglers mostly see it in a bottom-fishing or shrimp-trawl catch, or in a bay in winter.
The hybrid problem in northeast Florida
Off northeast Florida, weakfish and sand seatrout overlap and interbreed. FWC says the difficulty of distinguishing weakfish, sand seatrout and their hybrids is why it created its weakfish rule. It applies to "weakfish-like" fish together in a Weakfish Management Zone, from the Georgia line to the tip of Amelia Island plus nearby Nassau County waters. FWC says that zone is where most genetically pure weakfish in Florida occur. So if you fish the First Coast, a spotless or faintly spotted seatrout may be a hybrid, and the rule treats it accordingly.
Where you'll catch each one
- Spotted seatrout are the grass-flat fish of the whole Gulf and southern Atlantic: Tampa Bay, the First Coast, the Texas bays and up into the Chesapeake. They hold in sand holes, along grass edges and in deeper channels when it's cold.
- Weakfish are an Atlantic fish. They are best known in the Chesapeake, Delaware Bay and the Jersey Shore, where they move inshore and north in the warm months and offshore and south in the cold.
- Sand seatrout school in Gulf bays and the near-shore Gulf, from Florida's Gulf coast to the upper Texas coast.
- Silver seatrout live offshore over sand along both Florida coasts and come into bays in the colder months.
The mistakes we see most
"It's a trout, so it's a speck"
From Georgia north, an anglers' "trout" can be either fish, and in the Carolinas and Virginia both come out of the same inlets. A trout without spots on its tail is the one to look at twice.
Missing faint spots
A weakfish's small spots can fade almost to nothing in direct sun, or on a fish that has been in the cooler. That can make it look like a sand seatrout. Shoot it in shade, fresh.
Sand trout and "white trout"
Along the northern Gulf, "white trout" and "sand trout" are local names for sand seatrout, and sometimes for silver seatrout as well. Local names cross species, so go by the marks: no spots and a yellow mouth points to sand seatrout, and a small fish with a long lower tail lobe points to silver.
Counting on the canines
All four seatrouts have the two big canine teeth at the front of the upper jaw. That makes the teeth a good way to tell a seatrout from a croaker or a drum, but no help separating the seatrouts.
Why it matters: separate rules
Spotted seatrout and weakfish are managed separately, and the rules can be very different. Florida manages spotted seatrout by region, with different limits and closed months. Weakfish in the Atlantic are managed coastwide, with state rules on top. Texas has its own spotted seatrout rules. We don't print the numbers because they change. Check before you keep one:
- Florida: FWC spotted seatrout and FWC weakfish
- Mid-Atlantic weakfish: Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, New York
- Carolinas and Georgia: North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia
- Gulf: Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama
Photographing a seatrout for ID
Seatrout have soft mouths and lose their color fast, so shoot quickly. Use a flat side-on shot in shade with the dorsal fin raised and the tail spread, which shows whether the spots reach the fins. Add a quick shot into the open mouth if you think it's a sand seatrout. More in how to identify a fish from a photo.
Let Fish Scouter sort the seatrouts
Spotted seatrout vs weakfish is one of the pairs Fish Scouter's Fish ID is told to separate carefully. Its book also includes sand seatrout and silver seatrout. It tells you the marks it used, like "round spots onto the tail," and how sure it is. It uses your water and the month to break ties, so a faintly spotted fish off Jacksonville and one in a Galveston bay are weighed differently. Then it opens the spotted seatrout or weakfish card with the season and the current rule. Try Fish Scouter free.