Redfish Fishing in Florida

Redfish is the common name for several species of fish. It is a deep-sea rockfish that will give you a great fight. They are in the Drum Family, known as Sciaenops ocellatus, they have a reddish, bronze top with a pale underbelly. They also can be identified by a yellow ringed spot near their tail. We catch them about 10-12 lbs with the record being 94 lbs caught in North Carolina.

These redfish have a lot of stamina and we have had anglers spend an hour fighting them on a light to medium rod. We will use live fish, crab or shrimp for bait in the backwater where they like to bottom feed year round, they like to move deeper as they grow larger. We will find them “tailing” on the flats. This behavior is when a redfish tilts down to pick up something off the bottom and their tail rises above and out of the water surface.

Redfish have nice firm meat, mild flavor, and easy to prepare most ways. A popular method of preparation is blackened, but they cook up nicely most any way. I have friends that will grill the whole fish on the barbecue or in the smoker.

Florida maintains a “slot-limit” that permits anglers to harvest one redfish per-day that is between 18-27 inches in length. This rule was established to protect them as a desired game-fish and to save breeder redfish from harvest.

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