SaltyCajun.com - Dulac 6/15 snapper

8 yo daughter and I climbed aboard a snapper trip with neighbors sat am, her first. Hit the gulf around 8 with calm seas and lots of looks at rays, crabs and even a small shark off the bow cruising at 19 knots. She was thrilled already.

We reached the 60 foot depths w lots of boats and decided to push further. A mistake in hindsight as the swells kicked up to a legit 3 feet. A 4 yo along for the ride awoke to the bumpiness and didn't care for it. Tried one rig to no success and hauled back to 60.

No sonar, so played it by feel with pogies. Started getting fish halfway down 6 to 11 lbs. wasn't fast but began working toward the ten Attachment 51817man limit. Tried something different with light tackle against the rig with chum. Red snapper came up for it as did mangroves. No fluoro, but 3 small mangroves made the travel team and the remaining RS limit was filled. Several big ones ran us into the rigged - we were out-gunned - and we caught a few big reds free lining.

We had better success than all around us, IMO, due to a few things: big bait- our pogies were enormous, average 10 inches, but we broke them in half and the head and tails did equally well. Cigar minnows at nearby boats didn't do near as well. Even the 17 inch throwback keepers can handle a big meal. Weight and leader - use enough weight to get down and to where you can feel the bite. We also didn't tie up, just backed up to rig and dropped time and again. the fish move back and forth. Line and leader - no fluoro available, but a sizeable leader made things productive free lining , 60# mono to 50 # braid (doubled w spider hitch) tied w double uni.

Long day, but good times! Also dropped the trolling baits for kings and slung (2) around 17, 20 lbs.