kingfishing from pier

Long rod or surf rod. High speed reel. Steel leader. Biggest spoon you can find or anything that is shinny. Ribonn fish is also good.

 

live-line a goggle-eye or blue runner with a stinger rig (steel leader with one hook in the nose and the other back by the tail either top or bottom). Huck it out there and let it drift as far as it will go. You can use a balloon if they are up top and the bait wants to dive.

 

cabella casting spoon 1 oz. gold or silver
tie on 6" steel leader.

my last trip i used 25# braid on the penn 6500 & a hopper rod.
casts a mile. caught a bunch of spanish macks and kings..
lost a few spoons to secondary bites

 

for the big ones i float any small-med baitfish under a balloon. I keep the bait less than 3' down. 40-60lb wire leader tied to a swivel to 6 feet of fluorocarbon leader. they can pull 100-200 yards of line but mostly less when using any real drag. i dont use trebles because i dont keep them.

 

I've caught kings off the jetties in Port A. They'll hit rattletraps or pinfish under a float. I just use my trout gear and about 6 inches of mono covered wire. If they don't spool you you're fixed!

 

check out the pier section at pensacola fishing forum. You can read tons about fishing for king fish from the pier. The tricky part is retrieving your fish. Nearshore Kings are usually a little leader and hook shy, sometimes bait has to be very fresh. The right current helps to. Getting your bait away from the pier helps get bites too.

 

Use the wind to carry your bait out. The wind is nearl always blowing from the land to the sea (land breeze) in the morning. Look at hamptonsurf's advice.

You can also go down there and see what the locals are doing.

 

In my pier fishing days at Bob Hall Pier, I used to slide line. Use a spider weight as your anchor on a long rod. I used a 505 high speed which worked well. Strap a pvc pipe to the railing of the pier for your anchor rod. This helps your bait stay further out. As for bait, they eat anything that is alive. The biggest king I caught was with a large sand trout. Everybody has their own method for clips. You just have to experiment and find out what works well for your area. I tried this in Ft. Walton Beach one time and did good but the locals didn't like it at all because it takes up a little space. Good luck.

 

I visited Pensacola piers not too long ago, things that seem to work were Gotcha lures and flat lining a spanish sardine. Use the lightest wire available.

Gotcha lures in chrome with red or green head worked, or the gold ones. Thing that worked for me was fast jigging.

If fishing with spanish sardines (or any other bait), they can be found mostly frozen at most piers as well as bait shops. Use some wire and a treble hook, stinger hook optional. Cast against the current and let the bait drift back. If using a single treble hook give the fish a seconds before you set the hook.

Biggest thing that helped me catch fish was watching all the old salts on the pier and to adjust accordingly. Good Luck