Mullet run fuels Mobile Bay as warm Gulf water holds into October

What's next

Tides are running on different clocks between the two stations right now. Station 8736897, the more protected bay reading, shows its next high around 1:54 a.m. CDT and the next low near 5:56 a.m., while station 8735180, closer to open Gulf water, doesn't see its high until about 10:32 a.m. CDT with the following low near 4:59 p.m. That spread gives anglers a tide to work with across most of the daylight hours depending on location within the bay system.

If the mullet run holds to the timeline Saltwater Sportsman describes, expect bait volume to keep building through the next few weeks rather than taper off, with flounder joining the move toward the Gulf as water temperatures ease. The Waning Crescent moon keeps nights darker through the stretch, worth factoring for anyone fishing low-light tide changes. With water still sitting above 80°F, the better bet into the weekend is fishing the moving tide rather than waiting on a temperature break that hasn't arrived yet.

Context

Low-80s water in early October is on the warm side for Mobile Bay and the Gulf but not unusual; this stretch of coast typically holds summer heat into October before a sharper cooldown later in the month. The mullet run itself is the better seasonal marker here: it spans September into November across Gulf estuaries, which puts this week in the early-to-middle part of that window rather than near its end. Combined with flounder beginning their move toward open water, the region reads as being in its normal late-summer-to-fall transition, not ahead of or behind typical schedule.