What is the best time of year to chase tuna in the Gulf? Been lucky enough to have friends with boats that have allowed me to tag along at random times, but I am trying to pull together a trip out of Orange Beach to fish for tuna and other pelagics. Not sure if there is month or two that are best or if it is the same all year long.

November has been my top month but you’ve got to get in between weather.

I've always heard to go out further down the coast so you don't have to ride so far in the boat to get to deeper water

February out of Venice LA, fishing is much closer leaving more time to fish.
Orange Beach contact Johnny Greene with the Intimidator, great person and awesome captain.

Johnny Green or Casey Price . October or November.

Just got back from Venice. Way to rough to go for Tuna. We went with Voodoo Thursday. We had two of their boats. Capt Nick and Capt Alan. I was on Nick’s boat and by 10am we had limited out on Red Snapper and had 30 vermilion and we called it a day. Capt Alans boat had one small red snapper. That group was very unhappy. That group fished one rod at a time and all together had a line in the water an hour and a half. They were back at the dock at 1030 by the captains decision. To compare their fuel bill was about 250 and ours was 483. I would fish with Nick again anytime.

Nick advised if you want variety June is the time, but right around Halloween is the time for nice tuna. He also suggested skipping tuna and doing a swordfish and deep drop trip instead of tuna.

If I were going for Tuna i would go out of venice with any of the Mexican Gulf boats

See pic in my avatar…..

We are going with Mexican gulf mid August. Be my first time on a charter down there. We always trailer a boat when we go.

Nice Fish!

That was in November

Fall seems to be better but you can catch them at almost anytime. Any of the deepwater rigs can hold them at anytime. Late afternoon and early morning is the best time. Venice in October is good when the rod mullet are moving. February at the lumps is the best time and place to catch yellowfin.

From Orange Beach it’s good from now and on into the fall. It’s even better if you can get to the blue water after fishing the rigs all night and try for sails. Then do some deep drops on the way in for tiles.

Used to tag along with a group that would drop everything and drive down when the blue water pushed in South of OB / Pensacola. These guys were fanatics but it was fun. The plan for us to is leave wives & kids in OB and head to the rigs. Hard to beat mid-October on a boat in the Gulf once the heat/humidity began to fall. May plan on waiting until then.

Agree, its amazing in the gulf at that time, for multiple reasons.

we went with Nick a few years ago and had a great time. I think it was during the summer, our big goal was tuna and he let us know when we got there that no one was catching tuna so not to get our hopes up too high. We caught a ton of mahi and then caught a nice tuna, we looked like kings pulling up to the docks. We had the only tuna all week i think and a boat load of mahi. Nick/voodoo was great experience for us. Also reeling in a tuna with smaller gear/no belt or chair sucked. after 3 of us worked to reel it in, we wanted no part of more tuna that trip.

I have fished multiple times in the gulf. Crazy when the tuna “shut down”. They are still there, just uncatchable. Guess it is the foods they are keyed in on or something. Went on a trip last summer and marked lots of nice size tuna on the depthe finder but absolutely could not catch any (nor did any of the mexican gulf boats at the same rig).

Most times when we have encountered feeding tuna that would not eat our baits, we only had live pogies (menhaden). More times than not it seems, the tuna want a smaller, friskier bait than a menhaden. The captains that spend the extra time required to find the right kind of bait are the ones that I recommend. Threadfin herring, SMALL hardtails, or a fish they call a pin minnow over there, are all way better than menhaden. Those pin minnows are pretty much a sure thing if the tuna are feeding at all. I don't know what their real name is but they are a small jack looking fish with a neon blue stripe or 'pin". They can be caught on sabikis around the floaters (if they are present).

Cigar minnows and goggle eyes! I’ve caught both off the rigs legs and the tuna will jump on them. Tunas have relatively small mouths and aren’t built to cut larger prey down like kingfish and wahoo or sharks and cudas. They’ll smash the smallest bait in a spread.

Small hard tails are tuna candy! Big herring and speedos also work well. Menhaden are not the preferred bait but they will eat them in February on the lumps.

Tunas will smoke a live menhaden year round