I grew up in the Midwest, freshwater fishing. I have fished once last year on the Port A jetty with not much success. I am heading down there again this weekend (6/7-6/9) with my son. I have read a lot on this forum and other sites but it tends to get confusing and not real clear. I know different times of the year/current water conditions dictate what can be caught. Ideally I would like to catch some legal sized red fish, Spanish mackerel, flounder, however I would be thrilled with any gamefish. If anyone is willing to give me some tried/true and tested advice (Jetty surfside, jetty channel side, this bait, this time of day...) I would be grateful for years to come. Last year I basically tried both live shrimp and some cut mullet with a heavy spider sinker on the channel side of the jetty and constantly had either snags or my bait stolen. I was targeting bull reds and got skunked. Obviously I have a lot to learn about this new-to-me type of fishing. Thank you.

We usually use live bait, mostly piggy perch (pinfish). We bring fresh dead shrimp and a light action rod and reel and catch piggy perch on location with a tiny perch hook and a couple of splitshots.
We have also used live shrimp, but it's not fun to haul a bucket of water with live shrimp in it all the way out to this part of the jetty. If you have confidence in the live shrimp and sawdust in a paper bag technique that might be worth exploring. You will catch other fish as well as redfish with live shrimp. If you fish with piggy perch you will hook redfish 98% of the time.
We use a slip cork rig which is described in the tackle gear section later in the book. We will fish about 8 foot deep to start, and if we don't get bites, we will adjust our baits deeper. We've caught many reds as deep as 14' and even as deep as 20'. Usually the rougher the water, the deeper you have to fish to find the Reds. You can fish with any live bait you wish to bring or catch, and lures will work as well. Silver or gold spoons, large soft plastics 4" to 5"on a fairly heavy jig head, (1/2 ounce jig head with heavy duty hooks are a good start), 1 oz sized Rattle Traps, basically anything that can be worked deep if necessary.

Often Jack Crevalle and other fish often will be hanging along the channel side of this stretch of jetty, while Kingfish and Tarpon can often be found straight off the end of the South jetty and over to the Gulf side and where you can expect to catch most of the same fish if you have flat or otherwise not too rough seas and clean water.
If you free line live shrimp or smaller finfish, or run them under a slip cork you can expect to catch Pompano, Sheepshead, Speckled Trout, etc, along this stretch, especially on the Gulf side if the seas are flat and fishable.

We are not fans of fishing on the bottom on the channel side of the South jetty at all. We know some fishermen bottom fish the channel side while targeting Black Drum or Redfish, as well as Gafftop, however we feel there are better areas to fish on the bottom for Reds and Black Drum than the South jetty channel.