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Speckled trout, spotted seatrout in the rules, live over sand bottoms and seagrass beds in coastal water around the whole state, and they spawn inshore from March to November.
Since April 1, 2026, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission has managed them in nine regions. A keeper must be 15 to 19 inches long, and a boat may keep one fish over 19 inches, or one per person when fishing from shore, except in the Indian River Lagoon and the Northeast, where nothing over 19 inches may be kept. The Big Bend, from near Alligator Point down to Fred Howard Park at the Pasco and Pinellas line, is the one region with a limit of five a day, and its grass flats run off St. Marks, Keaton Beach, Steinhatchee, Cedar Key and Crystal River. The Indian River Lagoon allows two a day and is closed in November and December. The Panhandle allows three and is closed in February. Everywhere else it is three a day, all year. Everglades National Park lists spotted seatrout among its fish, with Florida Bay reached from the Flamingo marina. Charter captains and crew may not keep a bag limit on a paid trip.
Wakulla County. Turn off US 98 at Newport onto Lighthouse Road, County Road 59, and drive three miles to the visitor center at 1255 Lighthouse Road. It opens Monday through Friday from eight in the morning until four, and on weekends from ten until five, closed on federal holidays.
Open the guide →Taylor County. A Gulf coast community in the south of Taylor County with an uncrowded beach, good for sunbathing, beachcombing and watching the sun go down. It is known just as much for the fishing, with grouper, redfish and flounder all taken off this stretch.
Open the guide →Taylor County. It rises in Mallory Swamp, just south of Mayo in Lafayette County, and drains a basin of 586 square miles before reaching the Gulf. For about a mile near the US 19 crossing the river goes underground and runs as a subterranean stream, which is ordinary behavior for a river cutting through limestone in this part of Florida and still surprises people who are watching for it.
Open the guide →Levy County. A small beach in Cedar Key City Park at 192 Second Street, in a town that is more fishing village than beach resort. A roped-off swimming area with calm, shallow water, though the bottom is muddy and sandspurs grow nearby, so wear beach shoes.
Open the guide →Citrus County. Crystal River Preserve State Park protects more than 27,500 acres along 20 miles of the northern Gulf coast, between Yankeetown and Homosassa. Inside it are scrub, pinewoods, hardwood forest, salt marsh and mangrove islands, and where the freshwater springs run out into salt water the state calls this one of the most productive and biologically diverse estuaries in Florida.
Open the guide →Miami-Dade County. Congress authorized it in 1934 and it was established in 1947, and it was the first national park created to protect a fragile living system rather than a mountain or a canyon.
Open the guide →Redfish, which the rules call red drum, are fished on both coasts all year, over seagrass, mud and sand bottoms, oyster bars and spring-fed creeks in the bays behind the beaches.
Read the answer →Red snapper has two seasons in Florida, one for the Gulf and one for the Atlantic, and both are set again every year.
It depends on which grouper and which coast, and the one with a short season is gag.
Largemouth bass are in fresh water across Florida, and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission keeps its own list of notable bass water.
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