Thinking of Warmer Weather - SPECS

Not weakfish, but Specs, aka Speckled Trout:

Speckled Trout - Cynoscion nebulosus















not the same as Gray Trout, Weakfish - Cynoscion regalis /

see http://www.yankee3.com/Fish/Weakfish.html








The Fishery for Specs is an early morning, really early before sun up, and evening bite, once you start to see boat traffic you might as well pack it in..they are caught during every tide cycle, but either side of the tide when the water movement slows,.before and after the slacktide is probably the best, The larger fish aren't found in big numbers location is the key to the larger fish, small deep holes in the bay surrounded by flats hold the big fish.
Deep undercut sod banks and the mouths of tidal creeks away from main channels are also killer spots to check out, The school size fish can be found in greater numbers usually feeding right on the flats they can be chummed up w/ grass shrimp . you'll see them spray the rainbait and shrimp on the surface occasionally on the shallower flats during calm early morning tides , but most fish are mid water column as the sunrises. They are also caught while fishing for striped bass, but they are always a nice surprise.

Mouths of  small creeks that have a sandy bottom leading into grass is best locations to find them well inside the inlets.\
Around the inlets ,hard running water over sand on outgoing tide usually is best.
They don't need a lot of water,I've caught them in 1ft on small bucktails
In Southern NJ they don't usually hit surface plugs, but they will down in Florida.
In NJ, they usually begin showing up early Sept and can be caught into late Nov

Southern end of Cape May County is little more productive than northern end most years
but 3 years ago some came in mid-August in the 14-19" than they disappeared and
another school showed up in late October which were in 19-26"