I recently had the opportunity to go offshore fishing for grouper and snapper with Captain Christopher Weir, owner of Fish Huge Apparel and the soon to be Fish Huge Charters! Click the image above to watch the video of our trip.
Chris is a good friend and has been a huge (no pun intended) sponsor and supporter of Kemp Outside. Chris put out a YouTube video of this trip on his channel and you can check that out here!
Offshore fishing for grouper and snapper is one of my favorite things to do. I don’t often get too far offshore as I primarily fish from our pontoon boat, but when I can this is the gear I take.
When fishing in up to 100′ of water for keeper grouper, I like to use a Penn General Purpose Combo. These inexpensive combos are a fantastic workhorse for small to medium sized offshore fish. I would not use this combo for large pelagic fish like tuna, wahoo, or even king mackerel, but for grouper up to 25″, I find them to be the perfect balance of performance and cost. And they work great on porgies, snapper, sea bass and grunts.
If you prefer to create your own rod and reel combinations, I recommend the Penn General Purpose Level Wind in the 309 size and the Penn Mariner II Boat Rod.
For terminal tackle. I load the reel up with 30lb monofilament line and my preferred line is Berkley Big Game. I find this size provides enough strength to handle the fish I am targeting but also has a small enough diameter to make tying knots easy and gives me plenty of line on the spool of the reel.
In the video we are using a high low rig, often also called a chicken rig. You can tie your own high low rigs or buy them pre-made. The pre-made rigs available at Bass Pro Shops are labeled as chicken rigs.
To get your rig to the bottom and put your bait in the strike zone, I recommend bank sinkers. Having bank sinkers in a variety of sizes will help you as current and depth will determine how much weight you use. I keep sinkers from 1 to 4 ounces handy when I’m fishing.
Chris and I plan to get together on a regular basis to go fishing and shoot videos. Stay tuned to both our YouTube channels as we not only share our adventures, but show you how we do it!
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