September is upon us and the summer vacation trips with lots of kids and families were a lot of fun and the days seem to have flown by. Our Ft. Lauderdale fishing area will continue to have those hot and humid days, but things are going to change weather wise and fish wise as well.
Day after day of flat calm days will be interrupted more likely than not by some breezy days, especially later in the month. Frontal systems bringing markedly cooler weather to the Northeast will make their way here but the cooler air will be very slight by the time the systems reach us. But some of the fronts will retain their wind and that is OK as long as it stays reasonable.
Schools of bait such as Herring, Sardines, Pilchards and Mullet will be more prevalent here. They are migrating down the coast. The wind, assuming it does begin this month, will push more schools of baitfish into our area and those schools of bait are of course a source of food for larger fish and we look forward to this.
Action can be spotty at times but Sailfish, Kings, Mahi-Mahi and Wahoo (!) will be available. If the wind does blow a bit it will tend to push Mahi up on the reefs and that will make them easier to locate. Schools of Bonito still and an occasional Tuna. Find a school of any type of bait and increase the chances of good fishing.
The schools of Sardines, Threadfin, etc. will get attention of many of the fish listed above in the area, especially when they are on the reefs. The last two Septembers the wind caused the water near shore to become sandy and some of the schools of Mullet which prefer to swim near the beach as they make their way south moved offshore. These fish are somewhat different than the other schooling baits, in that they are almost always @ the surface. Inshore these baitfish get hit by many species including Tarpon, Snook, Bluefish (small) and an occasional Shark. Moving offshore put them in areas frequented by singles and small bunches of pelagic species such asSails, Mahi, larger Sharks, etc. and gave us the opportunity to cast to and hook these pelagic fish on spin in the deeper water as well. So some good comes with the wind from the frontal systems as long as it doesn’t howl and shut us down.