Today's (February 3) forecast calls for partly cloudy skies, a high of 76 degrees, ESE winds of 7 mph, and one to two-foot seas. 

Our fishing guide, "Snookman" Wayne Landry happily reports that conditions are improving at Sebastian Inlet: 

“Good morning, Sebastian Inlet fishaholics! I hope everyone had a great weekend! Here we go with this week's installment on ‘what's up at the inlet.’ Over the past five days I have seen good action —  not anything to write home about — but steady, nonetheless. One day good, one day bad, one day good, and so forth. You just have to be there when the fish decide to bite. There has been a smattering of different species wanting to play; not a lot, just enough to keep you interested. The majority of the good fish biting have been the black drum, and a few sheepshead on sand fleas and shrimp. A couple of pompano have been taken as well.

Beach side of the jetty on the outgoing tide has been the time. Along with that, the stingrays have been out of control, and everywhere, but not every day. One day. I saw one angler catch two at the same time on a double drop rig. Crazy. Also being a problem were the bonnet head and Atlantic sharp nose sharks eating everything. If you want, you are allowed to keep one of those per person per day, and they have NO size limit on them. They are good to eat, as long as you get the guts out quickly, and get them on ice right away!

Also biting are the small bluefish in the 12 to 13-inch range, along with jack crevalle and blue runners, also on any bait you are using. The big blues did make an appearance again, but didn't stay very long, only a couple were caught on large silver spoons. The incoming tide was the time for them. As for the flounder bite, it hasn't been particularly good, with the ones being caught small, 15 inches to undersized mostly.

The snook season opened on Saturday with a few fish being caught, but most were too big to keep. And several being undersized. Live shrimp and flair hawks were getting bites. Regarding snook fishing, there were a couple of ‘young guns’ on the jetty fishing for the big blues with gotcha lures. Gotchas have sharp hooks, and one of them snagged a snook; it was too big and it went back into the water, they started fishing again with the gotchas. You reel them pretty quicky and jerk then quickly so they dart from side to side to work properly, and they snagged another snook, too big and went back in the water. I watched these guys and they figured out that there was probably a school of snook where they were casting, and they purposely began snagging snook. Apparently, there was a school on the beachside swimming in the warm water, which is why they were able to snag them. (NOTICE: If you accidentally foul hook’ a snook while  fishing for other species or them, you cannot keep the snook, even if it is in season and in slot. However, Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) rules and regulations prohibit you from purposely trying to target one from a school of them you know is there. No snagging/snatch hooking of snook is permitted. If someone witnesses this activity and reports it to FWC, you may be subject to a citation. Please don't treat our snook like that).

Now back to fishing: The incoming tide along the shoreline from the jetty back to the T-dock has  been hit-or-miss. You have to be in a spot when the fish pass. Sheepshead, black drum, and whiting have been being caught on cut shrimp and sand fleas. I also heard about a couple small redfish caught, and they are still in a closed season. The flounder have been absent for the most part, but some of the smaller ones are being caught back by the ranger work area in the sandy area. Back at the T-dock, on either tide, I saw quite a few black drum, sheepshead and whiting being caught on cut shrimp. Not much else except for puffers. 

That's it for this week’s report. It’s improving as the water warms back up some. It was 60 degrees last week (except for Thursday when it crept to 62) and now it is showing 63 as of this report. And the weather for the next week and a half seems to be promising, with light winds under 10 mph and small waves at the surf. Maybe we are on the upswing for a change. I wish everyone a great and safe week.” — Snookman