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Mackerel fishing has been fit for a king

Photo by FRANK SARGEANT

Kings have been reported as far south as Venice, despite temperatures more suitable for June than October.

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By FRANK SARGEANT

Tribune correspondent

Published: October 18, 2009

Though it was too hot for king mackerel fishing until the past few days, the fish didn't seem to know it.

Kings have been reported as far south as Venice, despite temperatures more suitable for June than October. It's more evidence that the prime motivator of fish migrations is the calendar, not the thermometer.

The ideal kingfishing temperature is widely accepted to be from 68 to 78. When the temperature drops below 68, the fish move south. When it gets above 78, they go north.

But an even better determinant is the presence of baitfish schools. King mackerel travel on their stomachs, and it takes tons of bait to feed the tens of thousands of these big silver-gray speedsters that pass our coasts each year - north to the Panhandle in the summer, south to the Keys and into the southern Atlantic in the winter. And the bait has been here for some time.

So have the kings, or at least splinter populations of kings.

Bay area anglers have been connecting off the beaches in water as shallow as 20 feet, out to many miles offshore, particularly around the passes and wrecks, and over hard-bottom areas that attract bait.

Some of the largest fish are always caught close to shore and around the major passes, where they run the "color break" where dark inshore water flows into the green waters of the Gulf. Anglers often troll this break very slowly with large live baits such as big threadfins, sardines and blue runners to connect with kings in excess of 40 pounds.

Reefs well offshore also hold big ones, as does the edge of the continental shelf. However, few anglers make the 100-mile run west to connect with the large schools that are found there when they often can find good action closer to the beach.

For kings more suitable for the grill, most prefer fish less than 30 inches long; the larger ones usually have a high mercury content and should be avoided as food. Catching these "schoolie" kings, typically 7 to 10 pounds, is often a matter of getting out early in the morning and finding the baitfish schools. Frequently there are flocks of birds over the bait, making it easy to locate the hotspots.

One of the favored tactics of captain Jim Wisner of Tampa is to put down a large threadfin on a stinger rig - a single hook in the nose and a treble dangling on a short piece of wire along the flanks - held deep by a downrigger or a No. 1 or 2 planer. Wisner trolls waters about 40 to 45 feet deep with this rig, often not far from Egmont Channel, and consistently catches plenty of nice kings.

He's also one of the few anglers who catches kings on a fly rod. He anchors his boat, puts out lots of cut threadfins as chum, then whips a large white or chartreuse streamer into the chum.

One interesting tactic is to let the fly sink all the way to the bottom, then strip it back toward the top very fast. When a king strikes on fly tackle, it's a real challenge to land.

Most anglers stick with conventional gear, heavy spin or revolving spool, with lines testing 25- to 40-pound test. When there's plenty of current running, many anglers anchor and chum with small snips of threadfin while drifting several live threads out under balloons or corks.

Another effective tactic is slow-trolling around the passes with large live baits while dragging a chum bag with cut bait and menhaden oil. Anglers use a GPS to allow them to repeat long loops over the same area, thus building up the chum scent in that zone and eventually attracting fish to it.

Kings are the target for a number of high-dollar tournaments each fall and spring, including the Southern Kingfish Association event scheduled for Friday and Saturday out of Gators on the Pass at Treasure Island ( www.fishska.com), and the King of the Beach Tournament out of Madeira Beach from Nov. 5-7, which offers a $10,000 prize to the top rod ( www.oldsaltfishing.org).

The bag limit on kings is two daily, and the size limit is 24 inches from the nose to the fork of the tail. There's no closed season.

Correspondent Frank Sargeant can be reached at franksargeant@bellsouth.net.

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