Once the guide gets a bite or two from one area, he pulls up the trolling motor, anchors the boat, and casts into the promising area. "Depending on their mood," Chambliss explained, "I may anchor downcurrent and work the bait over the top of them if they are aggressive. Otherwise, I may anchor upcurrent and work the bait in their face if they won't come get it."

While flounder are avid feeders, they're not necessarily aggressive biters. A flounder's mouth is lined with small, needle-sharp teeth that they use to grab passing prey. Because of its sideways orientation, the flounder's jaws effectively open side to side, so it grabs the prey and then settles to the bottom, holding the meal in its teeth. Once the bait stops moving, the flounder rotates the meal in its mouth, working it around with those tiny teeth to get it lined up to swallow.

According to Chambliss, it's not uncommon to play a flounder all the way to the boat and then have the fish simply open its mouth and swim off. It's for this reason that the guide instructs his clients to give the fish a count of 10 before setting the hook -- and hard, to make sure of penetrating the fish's mouth.

Oddly, Chambliss believes that the ordeal of being hauled to the boat and then making a narrow escape doesn't seem to alarm flounder. Several times, he's identified a particular fish at the boat that got off, only to have the same fish bite again in the next couple of casts.

LIVE-BAIT TACTICS
One of the primary reasons that Chambliss favors artificial baits over live is that the Gulp! shrimp or pogy jig will often draw strikes from trout, redfish and a number of other inshore species. To clients who want to target flounder solely he recommends live bait.

"The bait shops around Orange Beach and Gulf Shores sell a baitfish minnow that's called a 'bull minnow,'" the guide offered. "They are a couple of inches long, and reds and trout aren't particularly fond of them -- but the flounder eat them like popcorn."

Bull minnows are hardy fish, easy to keep alive in a bucket. Other live baits of choice are Gulf killifish and small finger mullet. The angler who doesn't want to buy bait can easily collect both of these latter baits by wielding a cast net in the shallow pockets around marshy areas.

One thing to note concerning live-bait fishing is that the axiom about big baits catching big fish readily applies to flounder. A flatfish will indeed hit a surprisingly large baitfish -- but that jumbo offering will also tend to make even more acute the problem of jerking the hook free before the flounder can manipulate the bait into a favorable position for the hookset.

The same locations that Chambliss targets with artificial baits also yield agreeable results for those fishing live bait. The guide ties a simple Carolina rig, using a sliding weight with a 12-inch leader and a 1/0 to 2/0 bronze hook, depending on the size bait used. "It's important to keep the bait on or near the bottom," he said, "so about a foot of leader is all I use." The weight selection will depend on location: heavier in strong current near the bridge and rocks at Perdido Pass, lighter in the less forceful current around boat docks.