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How to catch Spotted seatrout
Spotted seatrout feed in 54–86°F water and bite best at 62–78°F. Fish Scouter's season calendar follows them in 18 waters; in October they are at their peak in The Panhandle, The Big Bend & Nature Coast, Tampa Bay & Sarasota and 15 more.
About
The spotted seatrout: soft mouth, two fangs, spots on a silver side. Lives over grass, holds in potholes and along channel edges, and the gators — the big females — sit alone in the deep holes in winter.
How to fish it
Grass flats in three to six feet on the moving tide; potholes and edges when it's slack. A popping cork calls them from a long way. Soft mouth: no hard hooksets, steady pressure.
What it eats
Live bait for it
Live shrimpUnder a popping cork or free-lined, hooked under the horn on a #1 to 2/0 circle hook; on a jig head for the bottom. The universal inshore bait.
Pilchards (whitebait)Free-lined or under a cork, hooked through the nose on a #1 to 2/0 circle hook. The one bait that catches everything inshore.
PigfishFree-lined or under a cork on a 2/0 circle hook for gator trout; on the bottom for grouper.
PinfishHooked through the back ahead of the dorsal on a 2/0 to 4/0 circle hook; the small ones free-lined, the big ones on a fish-finder rig.
CroakersHooked through the back on a 2/0 to 3/0 circle hook, free-lined or on a Carolina rig — big trout and redfish can't leave them alone.What to fish it with
the sizes that fish itThe rule
checked September 2026Managed in nine regions since April 2026 with different bag limits, slots and closed months (Big Bend 5 fish year-round; Panhandle 3 fish, February closed; Indian River Lagoon 2 fish, November–December closed; slot 15–19" in most regions with one over-slot per vessel in some). Check your region.
The current rule →