‘Working harder.’ It’s snapper season. But Gulf anglers may need to get creative

When the 2025 Gulf recreational red snapper season was announced, most offshore anglers probably saw August as the best time to take off from the water.

It’s hot, rainy, and usually a busy time of year for most with school starting back up for kids and the end of summer for others. And most importantly, the closed seasons.

Red snapper season ended with July and reopens in September, giving some an opportune time to relax from offshore trips. Gag grouper, red grouper, red snapper, and amberjack will all be open in early September and most anglers circled those days as the time to be offshore, instead of three of the four being catch and release in August.

But that doesn’t mean fishing stops. August is usually the best time of year for other snapper species in shallow water when wanting a meal.

In Tampa Bay and shallow Gulf waters, mangrove snapper are typically caught in high numbers this month. In deeper waters, yellowtail snapper can often be chummed to the surface on bigger wrecks, springs and other pieces of bottom.

However, the snapper fishing is not as good as it’s been in past years. When Hurricanes Helene and Milton affected us last year, the result was a lowered concentration of mangrove snapper in Tampa Bay. Anglers noticed, and it’s carried over into this year.

“Definitely working harder for them this year,” said captain Chase Krutzky about mangrove snapper fishing in Tampa Bay. “I should be able to catch a limit in 15 minutes. But it’s definitely not like that. It takes two hours to get 20 most mornings. They’re not coming up in the chum as good this year, which means they’re not as thick as usual.”

While not as highly concentrated in Tampa Bay, nearshore reefs, ledges and wrecks of the Gulf do seem to have good concentrations of snapper. I suspect the amount of freshwater and shifting bottoms pushed snapper out of the bay. As a result, they moved just offshore to the first big bottom spots they could find.

Further offshore, we have been having banner years for yellowtail snapper since about 2020. The last few years, not getting dozens or a limit of yellowtail snapper was unusual when conditions were right. We were even catching them on red snapper baits over hard bottom. But this year, yellowtail snapper haven’t been nearly as prominent.

Much like the mangrove snapper, the yellowtail snapper takes some grinding. It used to be pull up to any number of wrecks or big bottom spots from 120 to 200 feet and start chumming.

Not long after, the yellowtail snapper would work their way up the water column by the hundreds or thousands. The biggest challenge was keeping them away from sharks. But similarly to the mangrove snapper, following the big weather events of 2024, this is more of a rarity now.

August is historically a great month for both mangrove and yellowtail snapper, and the best option to fill a cooler during this time. As both species seem to be going through a transition phase, it requires anglers to think creatively by looking for them in new spots or finding other targets for dinner.

Krutzky said the mackerel fishing in Tampa Bay right now is very good. But when September comes, I expect more anglers fishing offshore than any other point of the year.

The two-week stretch of gag grouper season, in combination with amberjack and red snapper being open, will be a quick rodeo-style season that anglers are looking forward to. That’s if we can get good weather.