Florida & Georgia - Keys Fishing Gear

A couple of years ago I was fortunate enough to acquire a place, and a boat, on Ramrod Key. Living in Colorado I know next to nothing about fishing in that area but I would like to learn.

I have fairly substantial gift card from a sporting goods store that seems to have a pretty good selection of equipment. I would appreciate if anyone could offer some guidance / suggestions on some decent quality, moderately priced equipment. I believe most of my fishing would be 5 to 20 miles offshore as opposed to back country.

Thank you in advance.

There are a million options for you, but assuming you will be "offshore" beyond the reef I would suggest a as a basic starter so you can troll a spread. So 4 TLD-25's or comprable on matched rods, from either Connley, Pinnacle on here or name brand Star Rods. That will run you 700-1000. You can scour the classifieds here, or on CL and often find people selling sweet packages. For example I picked up 4 TLD 25's, and 3 Shimano bait runners all on Star Rods + tons of tackle, rod rack, Kites, kite rod and reel from a dude that sold his boat for $1k. Last year.

Fishing in the keys is broken up into zones if you will.

Backcountry/Florida Bay; which you're not interested in.

Oceanside flats; here it's bonefish, tarpon, permit, barracuda..

Hawks Channel; ranging from 10 to 40' deep for snapper, grouper macks...

The Reef Edge; 40-120' for snapper grouper, macks, kingfish in winter, cobia

The Gulf Stream; dolphin, sailfish (winter), Blackfin tuna (up to 30lbs), wahoo...

I'd go with this line up:

2 sets of 12lbs spinning gear. Think something like a Shimano Stradic 4000, Penn Slammer 460, ... Put these on a 7' spinning rod.

2 sets of 20lbs spinning gear. Here think about Penn 750SSm, Shimano Spheros 14000. Again on a 7' spinning rod rated for 20lbs.

2 sets of 20lbs conventional gear. Shimano TLD 20 on either a 7' or 6'6" rod. These will be your light trolling/drifting rigs.

2 sets of 30lbs conventional gear. Shimano TLD 25 or TLD 20II or 30II. This time, on 6' conventional rods.

There is just so much tackle out there, it's hard to make specific recommendations.

Tom

Agree with Danny on trolling rods. For reels, Shimano TLD 30's or 20's (each smaller than TLD 25's <- which may be overkill size wise) will also work fine for what you want to do. Spool the TLD 30's with 30 lb line, and the 20's with 20 lb line (clear Ande mono).

Reef fishing for Yellowtail etc. will need spinning combos @ 10-15lb, Sailfish 15-20lb., trolling for Dolphin/Wahoo offshore anything like a Penn 113 and better will work ( I have 6 TLD-25 combos and 2 Shimano 50's I use for Grouper while yellowtailing, and targeting Marlin & Swords. I don't think that the TLD-25's are too big I have caught a @ 150lb Marlin on one during a Dolphin Tournament. They can be spooled w/450 yards of 40lb line.

In other words unless your gift card is for $5000.... You will be dropping some out of pocket coin!!!! Dont forget you need an LPS1200 for daytime swords and a set of Tiagra 80's for nighttime swords. :jk::jk:

I sent you a PM

A couple of years ago I was fortunate enough to acquire a place, and a boat, on Ramrod Key. Living in Colorado I know next to nothing about fishing in that area but I would like to learn.

I have fairly substantial gift card from a sporting goods store that seems to have a pretty good selection of equipment. I would appreciate if anyone could offer some guidance / suggestions on some decent quality, moderately priced equipment. I believe most of my fishing would be 5 to 20 miles offshore as opposed to back country.

Thank you in advance.

JMO do a couple of chaters, one offshore, one more reef, bridges (tarpon)

learn how to fish the area and ask questions on the charters, see what they are using and match it up.

I wish I someone would have given me the above advice when moving to Palm Beach, I wouldn't be changing my gear around....after two years I think I finally have it right.