Yearly Archives: 2008

Winter fishing action is heating up. The Ballyhoo are schooled up on the patch reefs and packs of Sails are chasing them around. This is very exciting sight fishing, involving casting live baits to fish spotted from the tuna tower. We caught 4 Sails including a triple header all in 25′ of water yesterday. In adition to the Sails we have caught a 20lb Dolphin and a big Mutton Snapper casting to these fish as they chase Ballyhoo. In addition there are hoards of Cero, Baracuda, and Yellow Jacks spraying the Bait. In the deeper water the wreck fishing is productive as well with many freight train bites from fish that can’t be stopped.

Beautiful weather and great fishing for Steven Dean, his wife and their friends from Minnesota today. It started out with a Double header of Sailfish, caught by husband and wife. A dozen Dolphin provided plenty of action for everyone else as on several occasions we had 4 on at a time. We finished the day chumming with live pilchards and caught Yellowtail Snapper, several large Cero, a Mutton Snapper and numerous Barracuda and Yellow Jacks.

We have had cooler weather the last week with NE breezes. Sailfish are beginning to move into the area so we elected to Target them on a morning half day. We caught Thread Herring to use as live bait and set up in 115′ just off nine ft. reef. Within 20 minutes we had a triple header of Sails on and caught 2 out of 3. We caught one undersized Cobia on a deep bait before moving out to a color change in 200′ Out in the deeper water we caught an 8 pound Dolphin before quiting at noon time

Today we took a load of small pilchards down to the end of the Boca Grande Bar and anchored in 100′. Small pilchards are ideal chum bait and it wasn’t long until we had the big Yellowtail up on top busting the pilchards. We caught 20 odd Yellowtail a couple of Mutton snapper and pulled off several big bottom fish. At 1:00 we got off the anchor and went trolling for Wahoo. We caught a Kingfish and several Cero but no Wahoo.

The reef fishing remains outstanding. Steady west current and light east wind make for an ideal condition for positioning the boat properly. Today we chose a spot in 100′ and fished a 3/4 day and never had to move. The Yellowtail were large and aggresive, we caught 30 averaging 3 pounds. In addition we had a 14 pound Mutton and 2 Black grouper in the 10 pound range.

We went back offshore on a 3/4 day. We found weed in 650′ but very few small Dolphin. We worked way offshore without finding any Dolphin although we caught several Skipjack tunas.We ended up running back in to 800′ where there was a small east west weed line. We caught a nice pair on the weed line ,the cow was 21 lbs and the bull was 27 lbs.

Today with only half a day to work with we elected to stay in on the reef and Snapper fish. we marked a lot of fish on the first spot in 65’but they didn’t bite well. We moved further east in 85′ and did much better, catching 15 med Yellowtails several Baracuda, a bonita and several Cero Mackeral.

What are the chances of catching a Blue Marlin on a single charter date in Key West two years in a row?? Very remote no doubt and yet thats exactly what Jim Delpapa and his family accomplished today. The lucky angler was teenage son Adam who caught the estimated 160lb Blue in 30 minutes on 30lb test line. The catch also included a 20lb Dolphin for his sister and a handful of schoolies. A year ago on June 21st, Jim and company had released both a White and a Blue Marlin, slightly smaller than this years catch. With luck like that we suggest Jim play the lottery!

Dolphin, Dolphin and more Dolphin. The last several weeks has offered very steady dolphin fishing. Most of the fish are inside 600′ making for a short ride to the fishing area. Larger fish have been far and few between although most days we have caught a couple between 15 and 20 pounds. There have also been a few Sailfish in the mix, we have been getting a Sail bite about every other day.

We had two half days today, which is usually a situation that doesn’t work well this time of year with the fishing being generally further offshore. We Dolphin fished in the morning along a current line between 200 and 300 feet of water. we caught 8 or 10 schoolies and finished up with a pair in the 20lb class which wouldn’t bite trolled baits but fell for cast live baits. In the afternoon we slow trolled live bait along a 150′ color change and caught 3 sailfish including a double header, a 30lb Blackfin Tuna, 3 little Tunney and a 15lb Kingfish.