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It doesn’t matter whether you’re in Florida, Central America, Asia or Australia; mangrove shorelines mean fish. With their intricate root systems and tolerance for salt water, these plants anchor coastlines, filter tides and harbor aquatic food chains topped by predators we love to catch.© WWA

Not every bushy bank is created equally, however. They should, therefore, not be fished in the same manner. In a recent trip to the Everglades National Park backcountry with guide Mark Johnson, we fished three very distinct types of mangrove shorelines. Some bordered turbid, fast moving tidal flows while others interfaced with clear, shallow weed flats or deep, shaded undercut moats. Each mangrove scenario required a different approach.

To devise a mangrove strategy you have to figure out what the trees offer the fish. “The two things you’re going to look for are moving water, and cover and concealment,” says Johnson. Learning how to fish both current and cover scenarios is the key to mangrove success.

CLASSIC COVER AND CONCEALMENT

© WWAThe water was so clear and still we seemed to be levitating two feet over a field of grass. Other than a few barracudas and their high-noon shadows, there was no sign of life. I skipped a D.O.A. shrimp under a canopy of mangroves, popped it once and pulled out a nasty mangrove snapper. Fifteen of his buddies, as well as a small grouper, emerged from the roots and followed my snapper halfway to the boat before darting back to their shaded lair. In clear, relatively slow-moving or still water, fish are going to use mangroves for cover and concealment. This is the classic skip-bait scenario. Mangrove snappers, snook, redfish, young tarpon and various groupers all use the bushes for shelter and food. Under the canopy they have preferred light levels, water temperatures and food supplies all in one place, and larger predators can’t easily reach them.© WWA

In these conditions you’re going to want to use a subtle bait with a slow drop. Soft plastic jerkbaits are perfect. They skip well, drop slowly through the water column and don’t hang as easily on branches as most baits. Experiment with retrieves, but in general, you want to pop the bait and let it drop a bit before working it out of the shadows. Try to keep it under the canopy as long as possible. Shoreline deviations like divots and points are prime spots. Skipping is best achieved by emulating the rock skipping most of us bragged about as kids. Get your rod low, snap the tip parallel to the water and skip the bait across the surface.

If fish are really inactive, use a ¼-ounce jig head tipped with a shrimp tail or stinky soft plastic like Berkley Gulp!. Though live bait is effective, thieving pinfish are a good reason to stick to soft plastics. Just let the bait drop and sit. Something will eventually smell it. When all else fails, get right up against the bushes and flip your shrimp in as far as you can. See what happens.

Deeper canopy areas occur along slow moving creeks as well as mangrove islands with moats. These haunts can be five or six feet deep. Un-weighted soft plastics won’t allow you to work the water column thoroughly enough. Soft plastics on weighted worm hooks, like the Mustad Ultrapoint Power Lock Plus, will descend faster, as will tube baits and 1/4- to 3/8-ounce jigs with plastic shrimp or baitfish bodies. D.O.A. makes a nice three-inch shad body, and both YUM and Riptide make four-inch mullet bodies that I like. Try to keep the weight light enough to impart a spiral drop into deeper concealment areas. Obviously, if there’s current present, a heavier jig is necessary.

CURRENT AND OFF-BANK STRUCTURE

© WWAThough the classic idea of skipping a bait under overhanging limbs can be a fantastic way to fish, it does not always apply. Capt. Alex Rodriguez and I eased along a series of mangrove points in the 10,000 Islands region of Everglades National Park. My first impulse was to skip cast under the trees. “Don’t bother,” he said. “You want to fish the structure off the bank.” The water was too stained for me to actually see the structure. I just had to trust him. “The tide’s coming out here. There’s current and little drop-offs along the sides of all these points.” I watched a mangrove leaf float by. He was right. For the remainder of the tide, all our strikes came at least 10 to 15 feet off the bank.

 This doesn’t mean you should avoid skipping baits into the bushes if there’s current, it just means check out other options. “If it’s summer time and the sun is high, I’ll skip baits under the trees. Otherwise I’m fishing points and small drop-offs out from the bank,” said Rodriguez. Mangroves anchor land against the movements of water, so there are often troughs and subtle ridges where root systems end and currents flow by. This structure may be well away from the bushes, and is more important than the bushes themselves. Johnson agrees. “In a cover and concealment situation, there’s a lot of structure above water, whereas in a current situation there can be a lot of structure underwater, away from the trees.” As the tide drops, these Predatory Advantage Points (PAPs) can be exposed, creating new ones further and further away from the mangroves. “I think these fish know which drop-offs are good at which phase of the tide, and they move around accordingly,” says Rodriguez.© WWA

 If you could only bring one bait to fish a mangrove-current situation, what would it be? “A 3/8-ounce, wide-gap jig head with a four-inch YUM Samurai shad body on it,” says Johnson. Johnson tends to swim these baits, but with frequent bottom contact. “One bait? I’d fish topwater,” says Rodriguez. “Not that it will produce more fish. But it will produce bigger fish. Plus, it’s more exciting.” Remember, he’s not tossing topwater baits into the bushes. Topwater lures like poppers, walking baits and prop-tail plugs are great search baits as moving tides reposition predators. If you or the fish miss the strike, follow up with a jig and you’ll often catch the fish. With clients, though, Rodriguez shifts to a 3/8-ounce jighead with a Berkley Powerbait shrimp for clean water. If the water is stained, he’ll switch to a Berkley Gulp! shrimp and slow his retrieve.

© WWAColored water is often the case with estuary environments, so baits that emit noise or vibration are important. That could come from a topwater plug, from a jig tapping bottom, or from a soft plastic’s vibrating tail. Shallow running or suspending hard jerkbaits are a nice change of pace, and can trigger big fish. Spinner baits are also fantastic in stained water.

 Other common PAPs in mangrove environments are points – the more pronounced the better. Saddles between islands can also be rewarding. At first glance these saddles may seem uninteresting, but subtle tidal flows narrow as they pass between the islands, concentrating hidden currents and food. Predators definitely key on them, especially in the top half of the tide, when there’s more water and current. Aside from PAPs, gamefish sometime simply follow bait. Keep an eye out for birds keying on a specific patch shoreline, and watch for “funny water” (ripples that seem out of place) that pods of bait often cause.

Seasons can alter mangrove fishing. Shade is more important in summer. During high tides, fish may move deep within the bushes and be un-fishable. Dropping tides reposition fish and wash bait out of the labyrinth. During colder months fish may not seek shade, but mangrove areas are still attractive. They protect lagoons and mud flats that warm much faster than large windy bays.

HOW TO GET A BAIT OFF A LIMB

© WWAClichés are often overused because they’re true: if you’re not snagging you’re not fishing aggressively enough. You will get lures hung over limbs. The surest way to get them back without having to motor over and ruin the fishing is to slowly reel the lure up to within six inches or so of the branch. Let the lure rest so as to stop the pendulum affect. Once all is still, pull back on the line in a brisk, firm manner. The lure (assuming it doesn’t have treble hooks) usually pops over the limb without snagging. Be careful not to pull the bait in a direct line at yourself or your fishing buddy. Lures can come shooting back toward the boat. “It’s all fun and games ‘til someone loses an eye,” my mom used to say – clichéed but true.

THE VALUE OF A BUSH

There are 70 species of mangroves from 24 families of plants. They range in size and form, from shrubs to 200-foot-tall trees. Their submerged roots create excellent nursery areas for a myriad of fish species and crustaceans. The existence of mangrove forests near coral reefs often doubles the abundance of fish on those reefs. Juvenile reef fish tend to transition from sea grass to mangroves before heading out to reef areas. Without the mangroves as transition shelter, these fish must move directly to patch reef, thus exposing themselves to more predators at a younger age.

As for direct human benefits, mangroves buttress shorelines against erosion and act as a buffer to violent storms. The leaves are excellent absorbers of carbon dioxide, thus reducing the amount of greenhouse gases in the earth’s atmosphere. Coastal development for housing, ports, golf courses and aquaculture, particularly shrimp farms, all take their toll on mangrove environments. If global warming predictions come true and sea levels rise, mangrove forests will be one of the first eco-systems to be damaged.

Over the next decade it is predicted that the world’s demand for seafood will increase by 40 percent, yet we will also be destroying the coral reefs, mangrove forests and tidal marshes that help produce that seafood. If you’d like to help conserve mangrove environments check out these websites.

 The Mangrove Action Project: www.mangroveactionproject.org

The Nature Conservancy: www.nature.org

Pew Institute for Ocean Science: www.pewoceanscience.orgCoastal

Conservation Association: www.joincca.org

Mangrove Afforestation Habitat Creation and Restoration: www.mangrove.org

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