Can you keep a black grouper in Florida?

Also needed: State Reef Fish Angler designation, free, for private vessels

Counts inside the four-grouper Gulf aggregate. Charter captain and crew keep none.

FWC source page

Closes each year January 1 to April 30

Also needed: State Reef Fish Angler designation, free, for private vessels

One gag or black grouper inside the three-grouper Atlantic aggregate, plus a cap of two per vessel per day.

FWC source page

Closes each year January 1 to April 30

Also needed: State Reef Fish Angler designation, free, for private vessels

FWC lists black grouper in the Monroe County closure on both coasts.

FWC source page

What we left out on purpose

• Atlantic red snapper is deliberately left unstated. FWC's dedicated season page and its general snapper table give different size and bag figures, and a federal court ruling on May 21, 2026 postponed the state management season. Publishing either number would be a guess.
• Gag grouper is in flux on both coasts: the Gulf is closed through August 31, 2026 after a quota overage, and the Atlantic and Monroe closed by executive order effective August 2, 2026 with no stated reopening. The dates here are what FWC published; the daily rebuild re-evaluates them.
• The Gulf red snapper weekend and holiday schedule was read from a summarised page fetch rather than a raw table. The dates are reproduced as published, but this is the entry most worth re-reading at the agency before a trip.
• Several species carry separate rules inside Biscayne National Park. Those figures are not captured here.
• Mutton snapper spawning-area closures around the Dry Tortugas are referenced in angling literature but did not appear on the FWC page read, so none is listed.