‘Just keep cranking.’ Local anglers fight off sharks for snapper catch

Angler Lee Oung knows fishing during the day on the backside of a full moon can be hit or miss.

The big moon was on April 12, a clear and beautiful night, and that means fish like snapper are active in the nocturnal hours when they use the light of the moon to feed.

“We went out during the day right off the full moon and said, ‘Let’s go to 85 to 90 feet.’ We went straight to some spots and the show was amazing, and once you know how a mangrove snapper show looks, you learn to appreciate it,” Lee said, referring to a depth finder. “But sometimes they have lockjaw. Usually right around sunset, they turn on and you can get them as fast as you close the bail.”

Lee’s trip started the night before when he walked the local grass flats with a headlight, catching shrimp for bait.

“It used to be really good, but now a lot of people are doing it, and the bait boats are pulling nets on the flats. We eat the big ones, then use the smaller ones for bait. But they seem to get caught more now before they get to eating size.”

Dropping a mix of shrimp and live whitebait on light spinning rods, jigheads and 20-pound leader, Lee and friends had to mix up tactics to keep the bite going. They prefer to fish light tackle for more bites and cast back over structure instead of fishing straight up and down like most offshore anglers do.

“We were catching them about 75 to 100 feet away from the boat, casting a 1/4-ounce jighead. But with a full moon tide and a greenback with a cut tail, they were basically floating back, maybe eating 30 to 50 feet below the surface.”

While they discovered what was working, there was still a problem.

“Sharks! I think we did generally well, considering we were getting sharked every so often. If you fish with a 4000-sized spinner and miss a crank or two, you’re done. You’ve got to crank like hell. No pumping. Every time you pump, the fish goes to a shark. If you turn their head, just keep cranking and don’t stop.”

Many anglers like Lee notice sharks are a consistent problem, getting worse each year. Despite sharks taking quite a few of their hooked snapper, fishing this way produced not only a high number of mangrove snapper but big ones as well. Lee said the three biggest were all over 20 inches, with one at 24 inches.

“We didn’t keep anything under 16 inches. The bite was good, but we would catch five or six, then the bite would shut down. We kept adjusting and said we need to figure out the weight and bait they want,” Lee said. “Normally, the afternoon is the best bite, but around 2 p.m. they seemed to shut down. But we still caught lots of quality fish that were carefully bled and iced down well.”