Hey guys, havent posted in a while, had to even register again.. but, been trying out the jetties lately and haven't had much luck, have a 19' boat and have no problems getting close enough, just not sure where "the" spot is.. I have caught a ton of toadfish, sea bass, and blues, but I would really like some sheepshead.. any pointers?

I have tried the jetties all over, been on the fernandina side, inlet part, jax beach side, just always seems to be the same... and I am talking about the jetties in Mayport in case there are any others..lol. I have tried bottom fishing near them with a fish finder rig with shrimp(dead/alive) fiddler crabs, etc.. I have also tried to "bounce" a jig head with various bait along the rocks, just not getting the target fish I want.. Maybe its just the luck? Well, the girlfriend planned a surprise trip to the keys from saturday to saturday for my birthday, so I don't have to worry about not catching anything, going to bring the boat down and can let you guys know what I catch there if anyone's interested!

update: going to hit the jetties up this morning just becaue I still have the vacation days rolling ; )

Welcome back. Sheephead has always given me fits until I went with someone who gave me a little lesson. He says basically you have to set the hook before they bite. OK smart guy, so how do I know they're ready to bite? He just laughed. Anyway, they are pros at stealing bait. I improved my chances when I bought a bait caster and stopped using my spinner. With a spinning rod you open the bale and close it when it hits bottom, but you can't feel the line as it drops due to slack. By the time you close the bale and reel in any slack you've been robbed clean. With a bait caster I can thumb the line so there is no slack on the way down, thus I am able to feel any bump or movement of my line. I can also throw up into the rocks and "bump" my bait down the contour of the jetty. I'm not saying you have to have a bait caster, only that it improved my success.

As far as tackle I've used jigs as well as fish finder rigs. On the fish finder I only want about 6 to 8 inches of leader between hook and weight. The more leader, the more slack thus the less "feel".

Here's a couple of pics from the last time I fished Mayport jetties, which has been quite some time. It was by far my best day of sheepshead fishing ever. Between my buddy and myself we caught 37 in about 3 hours. We of course only kept our legal limit of 30. Wow, what a day.

Wow! Definetly a nice day! I will have to give that a shot, been using the bait caster now just because its my favorite kind of rod to use anyways..lol. I did go back and look and I could trim my leaders quite a bit. I will say that I have noticed what looks to be phantom bites where I reel up and no bait.. But I did have a decent day yesterday, two sheepshead, and man is it good for the table. I did lose a few rigs trying to bounce the rocks though Also not sure if you remember, but how far out along the rocks were you? And what kind of hooks were you using on the end of those fish finders? Keys trip tomorrow, holy cow am I excited. And thanks guys for the welcome backs!

Day 1, a little tired from the drive to do any real fishing, just messed around off the back dock and caught some really small mangroves and tarpon. Day 2, caught almost 30 something mangrove snapper, only 7 of them keeper size, kept 2 to eat : ) Also a couple of little tarpon.. not bad for a first day. Going to do a little off shore trolling tomorrow and we'll see what kind of good stuff I get there, supposedly the good weed lines are only 1 mile off right now. Thanks DFjoe, looked up that anchors aweigh charters thing you do, pretty cool stuff, good for you. Must feel like a million bucks everyday.

Sounds like you're having a good time, but what about this low. Been blowing like crazy around here. What's it like down there?

On the inside of the north jetty about 100 yards from the end and on the outside of the south jetty about 30-40 yards from the end.