Cobia
Cobia are usually colored brownish-grey to dark brown on their upper back areas, then they have a lighter shaded area of roughly the same shades underneath this area, followed by a body length line or area that is very dark brown to coal colored, then their lower body area is mostly cream to white colored.
Like with mostly any species of fish, the shades or hues of color can vary greatly at times, due to such things as the algae count in the water, the amount and types of vegetation, and the fish's main diet in the water is has been currently living in.
For example, in my current home area, I have fished and caught the same species of bullheads for many years, and I have seen this same species of bullhead, in numerous shades of colors, sometimes they are almost, black, brown, or yellow, and then I have caught some that were a nice shade of green. Cobia can grow to be very large, in fact they have been caught in the 100 lb range, and with a body length of over 4 feet.
When you hook a Cobia, be prepared for a nice battle, as they will use every bit of their size and muscle to fight to the finish, often diving or jutting one way then quickly changing direction in a split second, and heading off at a great burst of speed.
When landed Cobia tend to fight just as much or even more then they did when they were in the water, many anglers have been slapped in the face by their tails, and have had their glasses smashed, or even had their noses bloodied, so be prepared for a battle from beginning to end. Besides the fighting abilities of the Cobia, another reason they are a prized catch by many sports fishermen is the fact that their meat is very tasty, and cooks up nice and white and flakey.
When fishing for Cobia, one thing to note in helping you catch them is by knowing the areas they love hanging around, and such an area is near floating debris, the Cobia love resting and foraging for food under and near such debris and structures as; stationary and moving buoys, shipwrecks, debris covered bottoms, and reefs.
When fishing for Cobia using bait, the top live bait for them seems to be; eels, followed by live baitfish such as; croaker, perch, blue runners, flounder and then just about any smaller baitfish that live in the same areas as where the Cobia is living and foraging for food. If baitfish are not available, such baits as live shrimp and crabs work great. Cut bait does work, but no where's as good as live bait seems to.
When fishing for Cobia using lures, many anglers have reported much success using; imitation rubber eels, or even black or dark purple large rubber worms, followed by imitation baitfish lures. Another not so well known but great lure for cobia, is by rigging a worm harness with hooks, around the body of a 7 to 14 inch rubber snake, these seem to work great for Cobia, maybe because of their eel like appearance, or maybe because they like eating small snakes.
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