When a coast, a type of water, and a fish actually line up. If you elected Texas on the list, this page opens on Texas — Seychelles stays off the board until you ask for it. Filter by region, method or habitat, and species. The year bar is peak versus present. Limits cite TPWD and FWC — verify before you keep one.
Yucatan is bones and sail. Baja is rooster and dorado. Neither is Texas.
Ascension Bay / Sian Ka’an is the Caribbean flat — Punta Allen, permit and bones, biosphere rules, a modeled tide. Isla Mujeres is the other Yucatan desk: winter sailfish on the current, summer mahi, a troll-and-kite day. Cross the country and you are in another fishery. East Cape is rooster in the wash and Gordo Banks when the blue water is in. La Paz is Espíritu Santo and El Bajo. CONAPESCA license. No NOAA gauge. Roosterfish does not live in the Gulf of Mexico.
May. Baja turns on. Dorado, tuna on Gordo, rooster in the wash. Yucatan flats still honest if you beat the heat.
Type
Offshore
Trolling, the edge, and deep jigging. This is not the grass brief. Weedlines, humps, and named banks — Islamorada Hump, Flower Garden, Gordo, El Bajo, the Cancún sailfish current. Fly-and-teaser when the wind allows it. A heavy jig when it does not. Switch the method filter to Offshore or the engine will hide these marks on purpose. Roosterfish is Baja. Do not invent him on a Galveston morning.
Mexico. Florida: typically 10/person, 60/vessel, 20 in fork. Texas: 3/day in federal waters under HMS/coastal rules — verify NOAA HMS and TPWD. Mexico: verify CONAPESCA. Bahamas: check current bag.
SE Florida and the Keys are the winter sail coast. Bahamas bluewater. Texas: possible way offshore, not Matagorda. Do not headline a flat with a billfish.
Fly. 12 wt. A shot on a teaser, then the fly. Not a wade. Not a poling skiff.
Spin. Kite, live bait, or a dredge off the reef edge. Islamorada and Stuart in winter. Texas sail are a rare offshore event, not the jetty.
Mexico. Federal HMS rules. Yellowfin typically 27 in curved fork. Blackfin often more liberal — verify NOAA HMS and FWC/TPWD the morning you leave the inlet.
Eastern Pacific. East Cape and the mouth of the Cortez. Absent from Texas, Louisiana, the Keys, the Bahamas, Puerto Rico, and the Seychelles. Same rule as the rooster: this ocean only.
Fly. Teaser and fly. East Cape and Magdalena when the water is right. Pacific only.
Spin. Troll. Baja. Not the Gulf of Mexico. Not Texas.
Mexico. Mexico: East Cape and the mouth of the Cortez. Typically catch-and-release. Verify CONAPESCA. Not an Atlantic white.
Eastern Pacific — Baja East Cape and La Paz, Costa Rica, Panama. Absent from Texas, Louisiana, the Keys, the Bahamas, Puerto Rico, and the Seychelles. Lives on this atlas only on the Mexico Pacific desks.
Fly. 10–12 wt. A big baitfish in the surf. Baja and Central America Pacific, not the Gulf.
Spin. Live mullet in the wash. Same ocean as the rooster comb — the Pacific.