Piling in on pilings: Sheepshead are good in gumbo if you know how to land them

Where else would you find a convict, but behind bars?

The same is kind of true for sheepshead, which is often referred to as a convict fish because of its stripes. But the bars they hang out around are a bit bigger — pilings.

“Sheepshead are super structure fish,” Capt. Phil Rooks told the more than 75 gathered Wednesday night at the Emerald Coast Saltwater Seminar at North Light Marina.

“They eat oysters and crustaceans. They love barnacles,” Rooks who captains the charter boat Fish Finder docked at Legendary.

“And they have crushers for teeth,” he added. “So don’t stick your finger in their mouth, they’ve got strong jaws.”

Angler Joe Zwierzchowski, who MC’d with Rooks, said the Destin bridge is a hot spot to find sheepshead this time of year.

Rooks said the jetties around the Coast Guard station as well as the Mid-Bay Bridge and 331 bridge are also hot spots for sheepshead.

“At any marina, there are going to be sheepshead around their docks,” Rooks said.

“They are going to congregate around structures,” Zwierzchowski added. “And they are not like cobia, they are here year around. But they are structure oriented fish.”

Rooks said the best time to snag a sheepshead around the bridge is on an incoming tide.

“They like moving water … they tend to feed better at that time,” Rooks said. “But you can almost fish them any time you want.”

In cold weather, the sheepshead like the deep holes, so the angler needs to fish the deep water.

TACKLE

Light tackle with a slip lead rig works well for catching sheepshead, Rooks said. Ten to 12-pound Braid will get the job done.

“But when you hook him, you better get him away from that piling because he will try to wrap you around it,” Rooks said.

He also suggested using 12-pound flora carbon with a No. 2 kale hook, which works a lot like a circle hook, along with a small lead and a short leader.

“I like to use oysters when I fish for sheepshead,” he said.

If the sheepshead don’t want to bite on that rig, Rooks switches to another rig.  This one has a about an 8-foot leader with a No. 2 kale hook baited with maybe two oysters — and no lead.

“They’ll pick it up on the way down,” Rooks said.

Zwierzchowski said the thing to remember when fishing for sheepshead, “if they’re not biting, you’ve got to downsize your tackle.”

In addition to the oyster, Rooks said fiddler crabs and shrimp (dead or alive) are good baits to lure in the fish.

“But the bait has got to look natural,” he said.

Both suggest scraping the piling before tossing in the bait.

With a flat scraper, such as shovel or flat hoe, scrape as far down the piling as you can, “then fish around it,” Rooks said.

“It’s like chumming,” Zwierzchowski said.

And when fishing around the pilings, “You have to fish right straight down,” Rooks said.

But if you’re fishing near the jetties or docks, you got to put the bait close.

“You have to put the bait right where he lives,” Zwierszchowski said.

“If you’re not getting hung up, you are not fishing the right places or you’re not close enough,” Rooks said, noting the fish hang tight around structures.

CLEANING UP

Once the angler has landed the fish, the battle is just half over, Rooks said.

“Cleaning a sheepshead is like cleaning a tank,” he said. “They are a hard body fish and their fins are terribly sharp. So take care when you clean them.”

Rooks said he likes to use an electric knife when he cleans sheepshead.

As for eating, “it’s a good coarse white meat and real good eating,” he said. “They are good on the grill and in gumbo.”

 FOR THE RECORD

•Sheepshead must be 12 inches in length.

•Anglers can only keep 15 per day.