The Gulf Pier is noted for sheepshead, pampano and Spanish mackerel.

Redfish on the right, snook on the left, trout up the middle.”

That’s the happy prognosis for a grand slam at Fort DeSoto Park, on the west side of Tampa Bay, where the combination of perfect location and marine topography creates one of the best fishing areas on the west coast of Florida.

The observation on the park’s fishery is from Jim Wilson, park supervisor, who has the good fortune to live in a palm hammock right on the beach in a setting that looks like something out of the South Pacific.

Wilson is an absolutely rabid flats angler who is frequently out on the beach well ahead of daylight to make a few casts before he begins his long days as the park’s eyes-everywhere head honcho.

“The fish are often smack up against the sand, so it’s a matter of easing along the shore and casting parallel, rather than wading in deep and throwing out towards the blue water beyond the bar,” says Wilson.

All the usual clear-water snook baits work here, including soft jerkbaits, notes Wilson. A plastic shrimp is also a great choice for this duty, and the trick is to put it well ahead of the fish, then let them swim up to it before you start creeping it away from them. (Don’t expect to fish after the beach crowd arrives—the beaches here draw some 2.6 million visitors a year, and it does get a bit too crowded to swing a rod on sunny weekends.)

According to Wilson, you can hide from the wind at DeSoto just about any direction it happens to be blowing, because there’s water in all directions.

“I usually find myself going to the downwind side, whatever that happens to be, because I love sight fishing and the lee always makes that easier,” says Wilson.

Fort DeSoto itself, a Spanish-American War era military ruins, sits atop Mullet Key, which sits on the north shore of Egmont Channel, the main pass into Tampa Bay and a major fish interstate for everything from pompano to Spanish to kings to tarpon. And on the north shore of the thousand-acre key runs Bunce’s Pass, a snook fishery extraordinaire, leading to endless little cuts, mini-keys and flats that are loaded with reds. And down the middle of the key runs Mullet Key Bayou—lots of trout, along with more snook, more reds; you get the picture.

The bayou was always fair fishing, but became a whole lot better in 2004 when a cut was put through the Pinellas Bayway, joining the east and west arms.

“That cut is 6 feet deep, and we now have 100 percent water exchange in the bayou every 24 hours,” says Wilson. “That flushing has made a huge difference, particularly in the snook populations.”

The canoe trail on Mullet Key Bayou lead to some great winter trout holes.

My own experience around the park has been consistently good, too. The flat at the east end of the park makes off toward the Skyway, fronting directly on deep water of the open bay for all of that distance, and thus it’s a natural magnet for schools of jumbo reds that migrate in to spawn from August through early October. Unfortunately, several thousand of these big breeders were killed this past summer (2005) due to the extended red tide, but odds are more will move in next year. At times, the west end of the no-motor-zone at Tarpon Key, just to the northeast of Mullet Key, is like a parking lot with six to eight guide boats lined up tossing sardines to the rabid redfish. The scene makes up in action what it lacks in atmosphere; fishing is fantastic, especially in early fall.

Trout fishing can also be great on the east side of the park throughout the warmer months, with potholes and grass everywhere. Some of the best of these are small holes surrounded by water that’s too shallow to motor through; use a pushpole or drift until you come up on a green hole surrounded by the brown shallows, and toss a small jig, swimbait or topwater to the pothole. My wife and I once caught 32 trout on 32 casts to one of these spots, using 3-inch swimbaits. Most of the fish were 14 to 16 inches long. (Yep, we had debarbed hooks, and yep, they all swam off untouched by human hands.)