The Saturday Letter · Vol. 1 · No. 30
July 20 – July 26, 2026 · July fundamentals · Florida · 1 of 1 desk · frozen Saturday issue
Permalink: /newsletter/2026-07-25
This week on your coast
Snook still closed. Boca Pass is a heat-and-current problem. Summer showers can switch a Key West flat on once they clear.
This edition is Florida only — Florida. Coasts you did not elect stay off this letter. Scores are 1–10. They are not bite guarantees. Read this month’s seasonal fundamentals.
Florida
Florida desk
Educated fish, short windows
Today
high
Permit are the hunt — the wrecks and the falling ocean bank; pressured fish want a clean shot. Heat is the clock — first light or last light.
Snook still closed. Boca Pass is a heat-and-current problem. Summer showers can switch a Key West flat on once they clear.
— Tide is outgoing from NOAA.
— Observed water is close to the astronomical prediction — the table is telling the truth today.
Open the Islamorada briefBox score · July
Tarpon
Florida
Keys migratory peak Apr–May. Boca Grande Pass is the spring stack. Jupiter inlet and beach. Texas beach/passes mid-summer. Venice south passes in the heat. Bahamas: resident fish in bights Apr–Oct.
Permit
Florida
None in Texas. Keys mecca — flats, banks, wrecks. Bahamas west sides May–Oct. Puerto Rico: east-island banks, not Condado. Seychelles 'permit' is often the Indo-Pacific fish (Trachinotus blochii) — same job, different ocean.
Hogfish
Florida
Keys and Caribbean patch reefs. Not a Texas bay fish. Not a bonefish headline. He lives on the hard bottom, not the grass.
Yellowtail snapper
Florida
Islamorada to Key West, then the Bahamas and the Spanish Virgins. Patch reefs and the first drop. Absent from Texas bays.
Mangrove / gray snapper
Florida
The snapper that will live in a Texas jetty and a Keys creek. Schoolies on structure. Bigger fish on the wrecks. Not a yellowtail.
Mutton snapper
Florida
Keys wrecks and Caribbean hard bottom. Not a Texas red. Not a yellowtail in a chum slick.
Red snapper
Florida
Gulf wrecks and snapper banks. Texas and Louisiana live on this fish in a short federal window. Not a Galveston grass headline. Not a Keys yellowtail.
Lane snapper
Florida
Nearshore Gulf and Caribbean hard bottom. Texas jetties and the first reefs. Not the federal red-snapper story.
Black grouper
Florida
Keys, Bahamas, Yucatan, Puerto Rico wrecks. The heavy grouper. Do not print him on Galveston.
Tripletail
Florida
Summer Gulf. Traps, weed, and channel markers. Texas and Louisiana live on this fish. Not a wreck grouper.
King mackerel
Florida
Texas and Florida summer kings. The beach and the first wrecks. Not a trout. Not a wahoo.
Noise, not the headline: Jack crevalle, Great barracuda.
Rules
SE Florida snook (Jupiter, Keys, Biscayne)
Typically closed Dec 15–Jan 31 and June 1–Aug 31. Catch-and-release is still fishing. Do not harvest a snook because a desk scored an 8.
Charlotte Harbor / Boca Grande snook
Typically closed Dec 1–end of Feb and May 1–Sep 30. Gulf region, not Atlantic. Verify FWC.
Regs citedFWC saltwater recreational · current FWC regional rules · rolls in 8 days. Snook closures are regional. Boca Grande is not Jupiter. Verify FWC before you keep one.