Anna Maria Island Fishing Report – January 2018

Anna Maria Island Fishing Guide
Captain Aaron Lowman – January, 2018
Tripletail

—January in Cortez, Florida is the height of stone crab season. The commercial fisherman who make a living catching stone crabs usually have several hundred, to several thousand traps in the water at any given time. Each of these traps is marked with a unique identifying float. These floats are what I am interested in.

—Many times, when conditions are right, tripletail will be found floating just under the surface, underneath these crab trap floats. Tripletail are an ancient fish, with no real relatives left. They are an open water wanderer, associating closely with any sort of floating debris, such as seagrass, pallets, buckets, etc. Or in this case, crab trap bouys.

—Along with being a super aggressive fighter, tripletail commands respect on the dinner plate as well. Their firm, flaky white meat fillets are tough to turn down.

—Stone crab season concludes on May 15th, and I catch tripletail up until that day each year, but the best time is usually January through the end of February.
Come try your hand at this exciting sight-fishing adventure!