Too many questions

responding to crosshairy:
Thanks very much for your thoughts. I actually did exactly what you suggested (google maps to look for the first trench) last year and that was how i figured out that we weren't getting our baits out there far enough during the first 2 years. The section of beach we are located on seems to have the first cut further out than other sections, but that's probably going to be something I just have to deal with. So I think we solved that part of the equation. Also helpful to know that you've seen success using spoons. I would say that the thing I struggle most with is trying to figure out what to fish with. I have a 10' surf rod with a Penn 7500SS that i've had since I was a teenager (like 20 years ago) and I mainly use that for throwing bait and weight out. I have some larger spoons (like Hopkins and diamond jigs) but i've honestly never had so much as a nibble on them (and I'm not sure I'm fishing them in the right conditions or using the correct technique). I also always have a 7' rod with a little shimano spinning reel that I like to use while the big rod soaks. With this rod I typically use Mirrolures to try and get anything swimming between the first cut and the beach. Again, very little luck. I own some popping corks (regular green/red combo and a cajun thunder), though no luck with these either. Typically I try to use live/fresh dead shrimp with poppers, but in the surf i'm not sure how effective poppers are. I feel like I'm constantly in the mental battle of trying to figure out if I should be using bait or big lures with the big rod and if I should be using smaller lures, or bait with the small rod. In the end, I end up just getting frustrated and probably missing out on opportunities.

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Originally Posted by barnburnerAU

He's got a website too, can't remember it. If anybody knows it post it please.

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Just found the website. It's in his profile I believe

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Originally Posted by ironman172

I can't speak for him, but have known him to guide for families ....at least a adult and a child or 2....why not all learn instead of one....maybe they will remember things you don't after the days activities

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Thanks. It would be me and brother in law, so probably no kids. We generally fish right in front of the house in Fort Morgan, or head out to Dixey Bar. Caught the biggest fish I've ever personally landed out there on my first cast. Rest of the day was a non-event, but still completely worth it.

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Originally Posted by AustinLuke11

Catching sharks just happens, you don't have to be fishing for them to catch them they will take whatever you have on the line, we catch them off the pier all of the time, if another fish hooks on to what you are casting out then a shark will take it, it just happens. And as for the worry of attracting sharks, they are already there.

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Thanks. I figured that was probably the case, and figured they were already out there, just wanted to see if perhaps my attempt to get my bait into the first cut was i'll advised if all i'm really trying to catch are specs and maybe a red. Getting a shark off my line is not something I'm looking to gain experience with at this point in time. Best to leave that to you all who have the know how and skill set.

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Originally Posted by mforbesiii

Thanks. I figured that was probably the case, and figured they were already out there, just wanted to see if perhaps my attempt to get my bait into the first cut was i'll advised if all i'm really trying to catch are specs and maybe a red. Getting a shark off my line is not something I'm looking to gain experience with at this point in time. Best to leave that to you all who have the know how and skill set.

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try to walk along the beach down towards where any weeds are or fallen over trees into the water, both reds and specs will be in that area, or maybe a broken pier/dock or even and intact one

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Originally Posted by AustinLuke11

try to walk along the beach down towards where any weeds are or fallen over trees into the water, both reds and specs will be in that area, or maybe a broken pier/dock or even and intact one

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Thanks. Usually to find anywhere that might have a fallen tree or any kind of cover I have to head to the north side of the penninsula, whereas our house is on the gulf side. I've hooked a ray and some catfish on the bay side before, though I clearly wasn't targeting those species.

Is there anything to look for on the beach side that would imply better fishing conditions? Generally if I see birds working an area I try to put a lure out there, but it's often too far offshore for me to reach. Otherwise I try to find spots where there are little holes/gullies where the seafloor is uneven, but still inside the first cut. Usually these areas are very close to shore though (caused by the waves breaking and receding I guess) and I've never seen anything but tiny tiny fish swimming around there.

Pier and Surf Fishing Guide in Gulf Shores, Alabama

That stretch of beach where most of the rental homes are can be either very rewarding or a real pain in the butt to fish. Most of the beach on the last few miles of the peninsula has a very defined bar structure with a very shallow first sandbar that is only a foot deep in some places at low tide and you can usually walk out on the bar farther than you probably should with the dangerous rip currents that are common there. The close, shallow, and very wide bar makes it difficult at times to get your bait to stay where you intend it to and can also require a LONG cast to get over it. Luckily you rarely need a 100 yard cast to connect with fish as many fish feed in the area of turbulence either right in front of or right behind the breakers to suck up food that gets exposed by the breaking surf. Google how to read a beach for surf fishing and look for anything different about the surf that may mean that a fish might hold there. Any spot where the waves are markedly less pronounced than the surrounding water, the appearance of a deeper hole, anything out of the 'ordinary' can be a clue to fish-holding beach structure. It's not a skill that comes overnight and the beach changes somewhat every single day. If you strike out in front of the house, I would suggest either relocating to Mobile Street (beach access at the national wildlife refuge during daylight hours) or to Ft. Morgan point ($7 a head for adults, $5 for students) if the water improves significantly from all the recent rain-the whole bay hasn't been very salty or clear for a good while now.

Load your 7500 with 20lb mono and stick with your game plan of using a double drop pomp rig with a 3-4oz pyramid sinker(mono or fluorocarbon-none of the nylon coated prefab wire ones). FRESH dead shrimp or live sand fleas the kids dig up in the surf zone are primo baits. An alternative rig would be a heavy Carolina rig with the same sinker and beef up the leader to 80# mono and a larger circle hook. Bait with fresh cut or live bait and your chances for a bull red will increase if they're in the area. Sharks-especially the small Atlantic sharpnoses are extremely common in that area and come with the territory. If you're not comfortable handling them-cut your leader at the swivel and let him go on about their business without getting too personal.

Your smaller spinning setup I would do one of two things with:

1) carolina rig with about 1/2" egg or flat no-roll sinker, small swivel, 12" leader of mono/fluoro and a #4 kahle hook. Bait with thumbnail-sized bits of fresh dead shrimp or the aforementioned sandflea. Cast into the first gut/trough 10-30 yards and hold tight as you walk your bait down the beach as it washes along with the current. It's a good way to pick up whiting, puppy black drum, pompano, anything really.

2) Tie a small crosslock snap to facilitate lure changes to your mainline. Small chrome or gold spoons or gotcha lures are good searching baits for the surf and allow you to target the most aggressive fish and cover a lot of sand. You're going to get bit off eventually and lose a few lures in the process-it's just part of it. I don't go directly to a wire leader unless I see a lot of activity close to the beach and can assume that they are spanish feeding. Then consider a heavy mono leader or light wire.

I hope this helps somewhat. It sounds like you are heading in the right direction. It's hard to put a pattern together in a short amount of time-but build on your successes, take note of the conditions when you do catch fish and try to replicate what you just did.

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Originally Posted by Dutch

That stretch of beach where most of the rental homes are can be either very rewarding or a real pain in the butt to fish. Most of the beach on the last few miles of the peninsula has a very defined bar structure with a very shallow first sandbar that is only a foot deep in some places at low tide and you can usually walk out on the bar farther than you probably should with the dangerous rip currents that are common there. The close, shallow, and very wide bar makes it difficult at times to get your bait to stay where you intend it to and can also require a LONG cast to get over it. Luckily you rarely need a 100 yard cast to connect with fish as many fish feed in the area of turbulence either right in front of or right behind the breakers to suck up food that gets exposed by the breaking surf. Google how to read a beach for surf fishing and look for anything different about the surf that may mean that a fish might hold there. Any spot where the waves are markedly less pronounced than the surrounding water, the appearance of a deeper hole, anything out of the 'ordinary' can be a clue to fish-holding beach structure. It's not a skill that comes overnight and the beach changes somewhat every single day. If you strike out in front of the house, I would suggest either relocating to Mobile Street (beach access at the national wildlife refuge during daylight hours) or to Ft. Morgan point ($7 a head for adults, $5 for students) if the water improves significantly from all the recent rain-the whole bay hasn't been very salty or clear for a good while now.

Load your 7500 with 20lb mono and stick with your game plan of using a double drop pomp rig with a 3-4oz pyramid sinker(mono or fluorocarbon-none of the nylon coated prefab wire ones). FRESH dead shrimp or live sand fleas the kids dig up in the surf zone are primo baits. An alternative rig would be a heavy Carolina rig with the same sinker and beef up the leader to 80# mono and a larger circle hook. Bait with fresh cut or live bait and your chances for a bull red will increase if they're in the area. Sharks-especially the small Atlantic sharpnoses are extremely common in that area and come with the territory. If you're not comfortable handling them-cut your leader at the swivel and let him go on about their business without getting too personal.

Your smaller spinning setup I would do one of two things with:

1) carolina rig with about 1/2" egg or flat no-roll sinker, small swivel, 12" leader of mono/fluoro and a #4 kahle hook. Bait with thumbnail-sized bits of fresh dead shrimp or the aforementioned sandflea. Cast into the first gut/trough 10-30 yards and hold tight as you walk your bait down the beach as it washes along with the current. It's a good way to pick up whiting, puppy black drum, pompano, anything really.

2) Tie a small crosslock snap to facilitate lure changes to your mainline. Small chrome or gold spoons or gotcha lures are good searching baits for the surf and allow you to target the most aggressive fish and cover a lot of sand. You're going to get bit off eventually and lose a few lures in the process-it's just part of it. I don't go directly to a wire leader unless I see a lot of activity close to the beach and can assume that they are spanish feeding. Then consider a heavy mono leader or light wire.

I hope this helps somewhat. It sounds like you are heading in the right direction. It's hard to put a pattern together in a short amount of time-but build on your successes, take note of the conditions when you do catch fish and try to replicate what you just did.

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Thanks so much for this reply. Definitely helps me get a clearer picture. If you don't mind going one step further, i have some follow up questions. The house we stay in is off Beachshore Dr. (just west of the Kiva Dunes area). So i don't know if you were picturing that when you mentioned the conditions above. I definitely know that in past visits there hasn't appeared to be any kind of trough in the sand until you get about chest-deep and even then it takes a good heave of a cast with the big rod to get into any kind of deeper water. My experience sounds similar to the "close, shallow and very wide bar" you mentioned above. Based on all my research i did prior to the visit I was kind of expecting that the fist cut would be something like 50-100 yards offshore and that smaller fish would be in there, and that i could wade through that cut to get to the second bar and cast into that next trough for yet bigger fish, but I definitely didn't feel like that was the case. Getting past that first trough would require a good swim or a kayak. It was just a slow, gentle slope the whole way out until it gets too deep to wade and you can see the darker water in front of you.

With that being said, when you suggest using the small rod with the 1/2" egg/flat sinker and casting into the first gut/trough 10-30 yards out, is that assuming that there is an identifiable trough at that distance, or are you saying to keep to that distance even if it is just a flat-ish slow descent with no obvious trough? When looking at the current google map earth image of the house we stay in, the beach conditions i've experienced in the past aren't what looks like is being shown in the google image. In the current image (https://www.google.com/maps/place/Gu...ba715075f6d16f )
it looks like you can see a trough pretty close to the shoreline. That hasn't been the case in the past and i don't know when that image is from.

I use 20lb backcountry green mono on the big reel with 50lb fluro leaders, so it's good to hear i am on the right track there.

Any opinions on using the Gulp shrimp versus fresh dead? we usually try to get the fresh dead when we get out, but some days we are at the house all day and i usually bring Gulp shrimp with me. Caught a lot of ladyfish last year and one good spec, but that was all.

How do you generally determine when casting bait with the big rod if that isn't the right solution and casting big lures/plugs will be more effective? I struggle to know when to switch from bait to lures and back to bait?

I have a few gotcha plugs that I like using so i will continue with that. In terms of casting distance, where am i looking to work these lures? just beyond the break or am i trying to get these as far out as i can (assuming i'm not wading)? This might go back to your original point about the first gut/trough?

Do you attach the crosslock snap directly to the lure? I've always tried to tie only line to the lure, though i don't have a specific reason for that. I thought i had read somewhere that the "action" of the lure changes if you use a snap versus a loop knot (maybe on the mirrorlure site?) If you were thinking of something different, let me know. I'll try anything that makes changing out easier and reduces knot tying time.

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Originally Posted by ironman172

if your worried about loosing those, you really shouldn't be fishing where toothy fish swim

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well i think most people that hook a shark while their kingfishin gets a little disapointed or at least i do