Pier & Shore Fishing Outlook June 11, 2025

Pier & Shore Fishing Outlook June 11, 2025
By David “The Pierpounder” Thornton

Weather and fishing conditions were more like normal for the end of May. Except for a persistent nagging westerly wind and west to east current that brought muddy waters from Mobile Bay all along the Baldwin County coast. This was the result of flooding in the Mobile River basin more typical of March or April.
But back then we were experiencing a mini-drought, so this just may have been nature’s way of evening things out. Now that we are in meteorological summer, even though the Solstice isn’t until June 20th, our weather should be in a more summer-like pattern now.
That usually means more diurnally driven thundershowers near the coast around sunrise, then reforming inland through the afternoon with a seabreeze.
A switch to clearer water along the beaches came quickly the first week of June with a 180 degree shift in the wind and current direction. Catches of pompano were again common in the surf, including the Gulf State Park Pier. There the speckled trout and spanish mackerel bites have been fairly reliable except when the weather and water get unfavorable for a few days.
Following the forecasts may aid anglers in deciding when and where to fish along with being aware of the time and strength of the tides each day.
This fortnight begins and ends during the maximum tidal variations for the month. While the week in between will be dominated by less daily tide flow centering on the NEAP tide period of June 18th. The full moon is June 11th, coincident to the stronger tide flow periods, as is the new moon on June 25th.
The amount, or lack of ambient light at night may allow some fish species to feed better at night.
Many fish species have evolved to orient their spawning activity based on tidal flow and moon phase which in this part of the world are on different schedules. Spotted seatrout have excellent eyesight for nighttime or low light conditions and may feed or spawn more often during New moon periods.
While spanish mackerel have comparable sized eyes, but are mostly daytime feeders. But their spawning activity primarily occurs at night during the Full moon period. Similarly, other fish species have their own preferred conditions for spawning and feeding, which are greatly influenced by the tidal and lunar phase along with water conditions such as clarity and salinity.
Salinity is important to fish spawning because the eggs contain fat which helps them float and be spread by the currents. If their eggs bunch up after fertilization, they are more likely to be used as a food source by some other species.
Savvy anglers may take advantage of any pattern their target species exhibits to exploit them. Being in the right place at the right time when those fish are feeding, and having bait or lures the fish will bite is going to make these people much more successful than those just randomly fishing or casting. Whenever the water is clear enough to allow sightcasting the advantages typically tilt toward the angler.
Though many claim the water may get too clear at times and make the fish wary of hooks and terminal gear, and some lures. This is when stealthy tackle or even live bait can help anglers shift the balance back to their favor. The opposite of this is when the water gets too dingy to allow fish to sight feed from a distance or orient to schools of baitfish.
Night fishing around lighted docks and piers can be quite productive under these conditions because the lighted areas form feeding stations the predator fish can become accustomed to feeding around. That’s what makes these locations so valuable to night anglers including Seawall Park on Perdido Pass at Alabama Point in Orange Beach.
Structure is invaluable to most pier and shore anglers because the structures themselves provide orientation and shelter to a variety of baitfish and gamefish.
The Gulf State Park Pier may be the most notable, but the jetties and seawall at Perdido Pass are very productive at times, as is Little Lagoon Pass. So-called soft structures along the beaches such as sandbars and troughs also create sites where baitfish may find respite, or gamefish may hunt for food.
The largest of these is simply called The Point (named Mobile Point) near Fort Morgan which sculpts daily tidal movements into a food conveyor belt for gamefish like bull reds, huge jack crevelle and sharks of various sizes.
During these warmer months some anglers specialize in targeting large gamefish using large surface poppers, shallow diving plugs, and large spoons. They more mobile than set rig fishers, covering more water with lures.
Meanwhile many anglers are targeting spanish mackerel on the Gulf State Park Pier with Bubble rigs, jigs, spoons, and small to medium diving plugs like the popular Rapala X-rap in the #10 size. The old adage of bigger bait catches bigger fish often applies to spanish mackerel. So anglers using smaller lures on Bubble rigs usually catch mostly smaller mackerel in the 12 to 15 inch (fork length) size along with much bycatch of blue runner (hardtails) and ladyfish (skipjack).
Lighter tackle with 7 foot rods and smaller reels may be employed, thus are less strenuous on the angler. Conversely larger plugs (#12 size), frozen cigar minnows, and live LYs (Scaled herring) tend to cull out most of the smaller fish and attract mostly larger spanish mackerel and king mackerel, with bycatch like bluefish, jack crevelle, and bull reds. Heavier class tackle should be employed because of the higher likelihood of encountering bigger gamefish.
It really is a matter of personal taste and tackle rigging as to what anglers on the pier are most likely to catch. Best of luck to you!