CatchWindow fishing intelligence

Clearwater Beach, FL Daily Water Report — August 24, 2026

Clearwater Beach is a boat-and-paddle day first, a dive day second, and a surf day only if you enjoy looking at glass. Boating leads at 9 out of 10, kayaking 8.2, diving 7.8. Fishing is a workmanlike 6.3, sailing 6.1, wildlife 6.2, and surfing a flat 4.5. Those scores are suitability, not a safety stamp. Open-Meteo’s current and forecast picture is light and dry. Representative wind is only 4 knots from the SSE, with a day range of 1.1 to 7.6 knots and the strongest gust, 12.6 knots, due around 13:00. Marine waves sit near 0.22 meters at 3.65 seconds, with a short 0.2-meter swell from the west; the day’s wave range is 0.1 to 0.2 meters, calmest near 21:00 at 0.14 meters. Wind waves are effectively gone. That combination of light air, almost no sea, no indicated rain, and nearly clear skies is exactly what lifts the boat and kayak scores, and exactly what leaves surfing starved for period and height. Sailing stays middling because the breeze never really fills in. The tradeoff is heat, not weather. Air runs about 27 C and will feel closer to 33 in 90 percent humidity; the day tops out near 30 C. Pressure is 1017 hPa and rising. Atmospheric visibility is about 15 kilometers, which is not a read on the water column. Marine SST is a bath-warm 31.7 C, 1.3 degrees above average, and a 0.3 m/s current sets northeast—modest, but enough to matter if you are drifting or diving. NOAA tides put the morning high at 0.91 meters at 09:38 and the day’s lowest water, 0.10 meters, at 17:06. Solunar majors run 08:26–10:26 and 20:26–22:26; those windows, plus tide state, rising pressure, and light wind, are what the fishing score is built on, not a guarantee of bites. Wildlife’s more modest number tracks the same solunar clock, the late-day low, and the breeze. A waxing gibbous moon, 84 percent lit, rises at 16:57. Against CatchWindow’s recent reconstructed days, boating has climbed from 7.2 on the 22nd and 7.8 yesterday, kayaking from 6.0 then 7.4. Fishing is little changed from yesterday’s 6.1 and a step down from the 22nd’s 7.1. Surfing has been stuck in the mid-4s. Wildlife eased from yesterday’s 7.8. Tomorrow’s forecast brings a 15-knot peak and a 12 percent rain chance; midweek stays lighter before rain odds climb toward 60 percent by the 30th, with waves remaining tiny. Best bet: take the boat or kayak out on this quiet, rising-pressure morning before the midday gust and a warmer, breezier week.