A bay built for scalloping
Port St. Joe faces west across St. Joseph Bay, a calm body of water almost closed off from the Gulf by the long arm of the St. Joseph Peninsula and Cape San Blas. The shallow grass flats are scallop country, and in a normal summer the bay draws families who rent a boat, pull on a mask and spend the afternoon picking scallops off the bottom by hand.
The town is older than it looks. A port called St. Joseph boomed here in 1835 and fought Apalachicola for Gulf trade, according to Florida State Parks. It lasted only nine years, long enough to host the convention where 56 territorial delegates drafted Florida's first constitution in 1838. That document became the state's founding law when Florida joined the Union in 1845. A small state museum near the bay tells the story.
The modern city grew up around the same harbor and is now the seat of Gulf County. The Census Bureau's 2025 estimate puts its population at 3,995, up from 3,360 at the April 2020 base. People come for the bay, the peninsula beaches and a slower pace than the resort towns to the west.
Why the 2026 season never opened
The Gulf County Zone was due to open August 16 and run to September 24, per Fox 13's season guide. On August 13, 2026, three days before opening, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission closed it after a summer survey of St. Joseph Bay found very low scallop abundance. The agency called it precautionary, a way to give the scallops still in the grass the best chance to spawn and seed future seasons.
The closed zone covers all state waters from the Mexico Beach Canal in Bay County to the westernmost point of St. Vincent Island in Franklin County, so the whole bay is included. Fishing, boating and swimming stay open, and the FWC says it will work with the community on restoration. If you still want to scallop this year, drive east: the zone from Franklin County through northwestern Taylor County, which takes in Carrabelle, Lanark and St. Marks, is open July 1 through September 24, with a limit of two gallons in the shell per person a day.
