With the cobia season approaching, I'd like to hear what you all do to put fish in the cooler. I only had a couple of opportunities to go offshore last year, and while we saw some, and hooked one or two, none actually made it into the boat.
Where are you fishing out of? Gulf, Florida, mid atlantic?
I fish off Va, I swear it get better every year. All sight fishing with eels and buck tails, no body bothers with chumming anymore.
Coastal Georgia, Savannah area and a bit south. Typically we fish reefs around 20 miles offshore. Depth is around 60'
I haven't had much luck with buck rails here, but I've heard of other people having success with eels and plugs for cobia on the surface.
Danny:
Some of still chum in the lower Chesapeake...I had a good year chumming this past year.
Stan
When pulling fish up from the reef here they chase them up. Toss a bucktail with eel in the water or a chunk of squid and you have instant cobia hook up. Slap a gaff in them and you are done. One of our mates just free gaffed a 40 pounder a couple weeks ago. We got 15 cobia on one stop. We don't fish for them really but when they show up we get a few and a normal day is two to three and some days none. One of our regulars jigs with a Viking chrome jig and he gets one on the bottom just about every trip.
I don't fish for cobias but have a rod in the rack with squid on a hook just waiting for one to swim by. On our last trip a guy got one flat lining a sardine on a piece of wire.
They are not too picky.