UTER
Photo: Simões, N.; Zarco Perello, S.; Moreno Mendoza, R., CC BY 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Epinephelus morio
How to catch Red grouper in Florida
Red grouper feed in 60–84°F water and bite best at 66–78°F. Fish Scouter's season calendar follows them in 3 waters; in October they are at their peak in The Big Bend & Nature Coast, Tampa Bay & Sarasota, Charlotte Harbor & the Islands.
40 pts · trophy at 30"Feeds 60–84°FBest 66–78°FIn season nowLedge / hard bottomArtificial reefWreck
About
The Gulf's bread-and-butter grouper: a rusty, mottled fish that digs its own hole in the flat hard bottom and sits in it, in 40 to 300 feet. Superb eating.
How to fish it
Drift or anchor over the Swiss-cheese bottom, a knocker rig with a big bait on the sand, and lift the moment it thumps. Bring them up steadily.
What it eats
live pinfishsquidcut baitslow-pitch jigs
Live bait for it
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.
SquidStrips on a bottom rig for snapper, grunts and porgies; whole on a deep-drop rig.
Cigar minnowsNose-hooked on a stinger rig for kings, or a 4/0 circle hook dropped to the bottom for grouper.What to fish it with
the sizes that fish itLeader30–60 lb fluorocarbon
Hook2/0–7/0
Braid30–65 lb
The rule
not confirmed hereMinimum 20" total length; bag limit within the grouper aggregate; seasons differ by water — confirm at MyFWC.
The current rule at MyFWC →Where it is, month by month
PPeakSSpawningAArriving·AroundLLeaving
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