Welcome to John Detmer's Surf Fishing Forecast

John Detmer is a 20 year surf fishing veteran of the Brevard County Beaches. Arriving on Florida’s East Coast in 1985, John worked at Patrick Air Force Base supervising the base’s recreational programs until his retirement in 2006. In John’s words “I was blessed with a job that I wanted, with the Ocean to one side of me and the Banana River Lagoon on the other and a fresh water lake 20 minutes away and fishing was and still is my passion”.

Prior to retirement, in 2002, John created several formalized fishing programs along with guiding surf fishing trips for the active duty military stationed a Patrick Air Force Base. Today John still offers these same instructional classes thru local recreation centers and tackle shops. “Teaching individuals how to fish the surf and guiding is my great pleasure and I get to meet some very interesting people along the way.” Classes include surf fishing, long distance surf casting and river fishing just to name a few. Once retired John turned his love for the beaches and surf fishing into a business that has become known from Cocoa Beach to Sebastian Inlet as simply “J & H Surf Fishing”.

Contact John at321-777-5554 or mailto:jdetmer1@att.net.

Captain John Detmer's Surf Fishing Forecast

December 2015 Surf Forecast 

Surf Fishing continues to improve as we near the end of 2015. We had a great summer and a super fall mullet run that allowed  many anglers to catch their first snook in the surf. November anglers reported good action from Satellite Beach to Sebastian Inlet prior to the Northeast winds kicking in. Catching bluefish 14-19 inches, ladyfish to 24 inches, slot limit reds, snook and Spanish mackerel. Still absent from the reports are the staple whiting, black drum and pompano who have yet to show up in large numbers and sizes. 

The December forecast will see cooler mornings with a dominate Northeast wind and warming trend as the day progresses. Baits of choice are clams, shrimp and mullet in that order for the daily surf trip. For those fishing for pompano live sand fleas and clams are the ticket. I tend to use frozen baits of shrimp and mullet and buy the live sand fleas and clams when targeting the pompano.  

Tip: When you purchase frozen sand fleas or any other frozen bait from a tackle shop remember to thaw it out fully before using. If you try to hook a frozen sand flea the hook will break the fleas shell and it won’t stay on the hook. Hooking any frozen bait for that matter is like trying to stick an ice pick thru an ice cube, it just doesn’t work. So for a days surf fishing at the beach, I suggest you take live clams and sand fleas for catching Pompano. Frozen baits shrimp and mullet for the whiting, drum, bluefish and ladyfish. 

Final note: If you plan to take pictures of your catches, please have the camera ready to shoot when the fish is reeled in, take a quick picture and return fish to the water as soon as possible. 

See You on the Beach

John