Florida Fishing & Hunting in Late September

[fishslap]

My wife is house sitting in Orlando in late September and wants me to hang out with her for all or part of the time. Not sure I want to yet. I don’t have a hunt planned during the period but was going to try for a returned CO muzzleloader elk tag. Things that interest me in Florida are:
-Fly fishing for exotics such as Mayan cichlids, tilapia, and peacocks in that order.
-Shooting some iguana

Should I go for a few weeks? Any guide recommendations for the activities above? I don’t mind driving a few hours south either. I can work remotely and taking some vacation day time isn’t an issue.

Any other hunting/fishing I should consider that time of year?

 

[effinalders]

I lived in North Florida for a long time. One of the things that I always wanted to do, but never got around to is Tarpon Fishing. There should still be some in Boca Grande during that time frame, but the height of the season has passed, so it probably won't be as crowded.

I can't really advise on the things you listed as I never fished South Florida.

 

[dribeerfeht]

Relocated Floridian here...use the Florida Sportsman (magazine) website for good info. I'm from Jupiter FL, but have hunted (deer, hogs, birds) and fished (fresh, salt, and everything in between) all over the state....still do when I can.

 

[effinalders]

I loved Florida Sportsman when I lived there. I thought about mentioning it in my post, but wasn't sure if it was still in publication. If it has a searchable database or old editions that you could look through it might be worth signing up. I remember that it used to have breakdowns of best options by region each month. You could probably look at previous years editions for the time period you are thinking about going down there to get some ideas.

 

[thinhorn_AK]

Go fly fishing for tarpon, that’s all I’d do if I lived in Florida.

 

[dribeerfeht]

Go fly fishing for tarpon, that’s all I’d do if I lived in Florida.

Love to sight fish! Especially Tarpon and snook. Fall bait run should start that time of year causing all kinds of havoc on the beaches and inshore. Fall shrimp should start too. Lots of opportunities!

 

[young7.3]

We were in Florida for 5 weeks and I discovered flounder spearing. We were in Carabelle on a private beach but Im sure you can do a little research and find some spots.

Essentially, you walk the shallows at night with a light and spear and gig the flounder while they are waiting to ambush prey. Super fun and great tasting meat!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Sizthediz]

Unfortunately non of that will happen in Orlando. South to Miami/ keys for peacock and iguana( not even sure if you can hunt iguana here better check with fwc website) not sure about tarpon that late in the year either. Snook, trout and reds inshore. Offshore for groupa.If I was gonna go for poon, boca grande is the place. Good luck have fun

 

[fishslap]

Thanks guys. Good advice. For some reason I don’t have much interest in tarpon. Redfish or grouper sound interesting.

 

[Jmoore]

We were down there last year late summer and fished okeechobee for one day then headed a couple hours south to boca raton for a few days and hunted iguana and caught some peacocks and snakehead.
It was a blast.

 

[fishslap]

We were down there last year late summer and fished okeechobee for one day then headed a couple hours south to boca raton for a few days and hunted iguana and caught some peacocks and snakehead.
It was a blast.

Thanks. That’s what I was thinking about. Did you hire a guide for the iguana and peacocks?

 

[Jmoore]

Thanks. That’s what I was thinking about. Did you hire a guide for the iguana and peacocks?

Yes sir. For the iguanas we went with jp outfitters and the fish we went with Jurassic Park Fishing Charters.
Both guys were great and I have no complaints.

 

[Jmoore]

Now that I’m thinking about it. My wife went to play pickleball one evening….. me and the boys aren’t for sitting still so we got some cheap stuff at walmart and hit the road side canals and caught some 2-3# peacocks that way too.

 

[thinhorn_AK]

Love to sight fish! Especially Tarpon and snook. Fall bait run should start that time of year causing all kinds of havoc on the beaches and inshore. Fall shrimp should start too. Lots of opportunities!

Yeah sight fishing for bonefish and tarpon is amazing. Amazing to the point that I can almost (almost) see living in Florida for the opportunity.

I just got back from an ascension bay and landed some tarpon and lots of bonefish. No permit though, I had one on the line but he popped off, must not have set the hook hard enough.

That’s the hard part, setting the hook by stripping line, just not second nature to me. Bone fish are easy, tarpon you really have to strip hard.