While fishing for grouper on my yellowtail spots we also got a few nassau groupers, which are protected and we released them unharmed to fight another day.  When you got your yellowtail spot all chummed up it is always good to drop down some small baits like half of a ballyhoo or small pinfish for some great mangrove action.

Speaking of mangroves, the bite has been great at night.  Don’t rush out there, because the bite hasn’t started ’til late.  If you leave around 9:00PM you will be able to fish for a few hours to get your limit.  Fishing out in Federal waters you are allowed to keep ten mangroves, but if you fish close to shore in state waters you may only keep five mangroves.  Make sure you know where you are fishing so as to not accidentally go over your legal limit.

The bait has been abundant so you really don’t need to bring a lot out with you.  Pilchards and gogs are swarming, and all you need to catch them is a few sabiki rigs or a cast net if you know how to throw one.  I prefer to drift back large baits for the bigger mangroves.  The small ones can peck at it until the big one comes and steals it from them.  My rig is usually 40-pound leader with a small slip sinker like 1/16^th –1/8^th oz.  I slowly drift back the bait until I get a taker and I feed the bait for about 6-10 feet before a set the hook.  You don’t get every one, but if it is a big fish he will have that bait down his throat and you should hook almost all of them.  You don’t need lots chum, just enough to keep the bait around the boat, which keeps the snappers there.

Towards the end of this week we fished for muttons and amberjacks.  Since this is the last moon of the spawn we took advantage of it.  We didn’t set the world on fire but we managed 3-6 muttons each day with lots of other action such as amberjacks, jack crevales, and kingfish.  There has been an abundant amount of kingfish this week, which is a little unusual.  We have kings all year round, but during the summer months they are few and far in between.  We even got one that pushed 40 pounds but most of them are 10-15 pounds.  They aren’t the best eating, but if you smoke them they are out of this world.

The dolphin picked up this past week, with fish from 6-30 pounds.  I haven’t been out there, but my friends have shot out there a couple of times this week and have come back with some impressive catches.  On Thursday, Big Time Bait and Tackle put on a tournament with Maui Jims Sunglass Co.  I was one of the lucky individuals who took out one representative and writers from all of the major fishing magazines for a day of fishing.  It was supposed to be a dolphin tournament, but since it was blowing 20-25 knots, we all weren’t going offshore…so they changed the rules to heaviest weighable fish.

I ended up winning with a 39-pound amberjack.  It was just a friendly tournament, but the writer who caught the biggest fish won a trip to Hawaii.  This whole trip was set up to let these writers experience the Maui Jim’s sunglasses.  I got to try on a bunch of them and I am hooked.  I really saw the difference between my Costa’s and the Maui Jims; I am a Maui Jim guy now.  We also caught three large muttons around 18 pounds a piece.

Just to let everyone know, there is no oil down here and hotels are starting to drop their prices so come on down and enjoy the Keys like the rest of us are!

Most of the fish have been congregating on the edge of the Gulf Stream and a few miles beyond.  Most of the fish are under birds, but when looking for fish, try and find as few birds together as possible. This will indicate dolphin instead of skippies.  My magic number is two to three birds for big fish, but five birds can be either schoolies or a bunch of big dolphin.  You just never know what going to be under a huge flock of birds either, but in most cases they are skippies.  If the skippies are small, you might find wahoo or marlin close by.  When I fished in Costa Rica, I learned to troll around the birds and not through them to raise billfish.  The billfish are looking for the few bait fish that get separated from the school, it seems that they can take them out easier one at a time than trying to slash into a ball of moving fish.  I learned that one on the discovery channel.

The tuna have been biting pretty good on the live bait. Jigs seem to catch a few 10 pounders, but if you’re looking for the big ones, you will need plenty of live pilchards.  Getting the pilchards hasn’t been hard if you venture out on the reef after dark.  Anchoring anywhere from 18-40 feet of water after dark you can enjoy the great mangrove bite and load up on pilchards for the following day to the hump.  If you anchor in 40 feet of water, the pilchards will be a little less dense, but the gogs are much thicker in this deeper water.  By using the bigger sabiki rigs you can keep more gogs on the line without as many coming off.  The sword fishing report was good, and my Buddy Capt. Brian caught a 350-pound mako with his clients.

You have to get out to the wrecks and catch some muttons! They are still biting ok. Many days I get six or so with all the amberjack action you could want.  The muttons have been averaging about 12 pounds, with some into the 25-pound class.  Live bait is where it’s been at. Pinfish, cigars, grunts, and crabs have all been producing well.  Dead bait which can work well when the fish are stacked up, it really hasn’t been working for lately, but I always keep throwing some dead baits down because sometimes they will get lazy and catching a live bait just seems like too much effort sometimes.  Split tailed baits or plugs will work, even strips of bonita are some of my favorite dead bottom baits.

I am headed to the Tortugas for a few days, and I will post again after I get back so check sometime after Tuesday.  Have a great “Fourth” and don’t forget that it is our military that we really need to thank so that we can go fishing.  Remember that here in Marathon you don’t have to drive home, call a cab and for a few bucks extra they will drive your car home for you.

The next day we went wreck fishing.  We caught five amberjacks and three muttons.  The muttons seem to biting from 140-180 feet of water.  They weren’t biting great but we did miss quite a few other fish, which could have been other muttons as well.  We tried heading offshore again for a few days only to catch a few schoolies, which were legal to harvest.  The bite at the hump was slow, too; lack of current seemed to have hindered all the fishing.

I went yellow tailing only to have the lack of current hinder that as well.  So we went mutton fishing and caught a few muttons from 15-20 pounds.  We also got our fair share of amberjacks too.  While we were yellow tailing I dropped some pinfish to the bottom.  The bottom bite was active.  We caught two goliaths from 30-70 pounds, a Nassau grouper weighing in at 25 pounds and plenty of five-pound mangrove snappers.

Towards the end of the week I heard of a few big fish being caught or seen, but not much.  The large schoolies have been numerous east of the Marathon Hump from 1100-1300 feet of water.  Basically all you wanted if you wanted to travel that far to the east.  Most of the fish have been reported from Holiday Isle to Caloosa Cove.

The mangrove spawn is just starting, so get out of the heat and fish at night from 25-70 feet of water.  Lots of bait out on the reef too, so you might want to bring your cast net or sabiki rigs.

Thanks to the East wind, the sails were piling down the pipeline and boats with upper stations had a ball sight fishing for those acrobatic speedsters. Even though they were being finicky, there were many sailfish to be had. With the ballyhoo hard to find, the choice of bait here in Marathon has been pilchards, which really is a better bait for sight fishing. I like to hook the bait in the belly to force the pilchard down which usually entices the sailfish to strike.

There has been an incredible color edge off of Marathon all week with lots of sailfish action on it. The bite had been better the further West you went. Some boats fished all the way down to American shoals (what a hike!), but in order to put up big numbers of fish that’s where you needed to be. Along with the sails, cobia and dolphin are also being caught along that edge.

The deeper edge further offshore that had the dolphin last week dried right up as if it was never there. I would keep looking for dolphin just beyond the color change and out as far as 400 feet just in case there is another push of fish this week.

The wrecks have been hit hard for the past few weeks and the fishing pressure has made a definite impact on the bite, which was out of this world. The wrecks are still producing amberjacks, muttons, and beautiful grouper, which we have been releasing. I caught a small genuine red snapper, which is not common in these parts except for a few deeper wrecks during certain times of the year.

The bait of choice on the mutton snapper bite has been live pinfish and any small grunts, which I was able to catch. The tomtates, my favorite bait has been hard to come by, but pinfish seem to be doing the job just fine.

Kingfish have been on most of the deeper wrecks from 130-200 feet of water. I was mainly catching them with deep-trolled ballyhoo. I heard that the reef also had kingfish prowling behind the yellowtails. When fishing for yellow tails, the kings will be hanging back waiting for the right time to strike.

The hump has been red hot. The tunas have been biting better in the afternoon verses the morning, but that may be due to the full moon we have had and the tunas must be feasting on the squid all night long. Jigging for the tunas has resulted in more and bigger fish, but when it becomes overcast the larger tunas will hit the trolled baits too.

The live baiter out there have been harassed by all the boat traffic out there, so if you see a boat using live bait, give him some room and respect that he can’t catch his fish when boats come barreling up behind them. While we were out offshore we did a little deep dropping and yielded some quality queen snappers. Most of the queens were up in the 12-18 pound class, which is some quality fish. Snowys and tilefish are abundant right now too in the 800-700 foot range.

I had a charter which took me out in the bay. I normally don’t fish out here but when the weather gets rough and my clients can’t take the big seas we head out there for some action packed fishing. They wanted to catch some goliaths and the bay didn’t let us down. We caught a couple in the 30 pound class and two big ones one was about 100 pounds and the other had to 350 pounds if it wasn’t 400 pounds. Most of the mackerel have left the bay but we did manage to get a dozen or so.

The bluefish on the other hand have been ransacking our baits in packs of 20-50 fish strong. It is pretty cool to se 20 or so fish following the one you have hooked. When this happens I like to throw some cut chunks right behind the hooked fish to get them really fired up before I pitch a spoon or a jig with a ballyhoo on it to get multiple hookups. We had out a shark bait for most of the day but we only had a couple of small ones short strike the bait.

Have a great week and I will see you out there. For those of you who haven’t signed the petition please sign it, we need everyone in on this one. Lets take back our rights to fish here come sign this petition!

If sailfish isn’t your thing the dolphin have showed up in great numbers just not any size to them though.  I have heard of a few gaffer size fish but for the most part the fish are running small from 28 inches to 15 inches.  Lots of throwback dolphin being caught, and lots of fun to be had.  We had caught over 50-60 fish with only 20 keepers one day and 15 keepers the next.  The fish have been out on a current edge just inside of 500 feet of water.  The water temperatures hare cool for them but it hasn’t seemed to influence their appetite.  The fish are moving in small packs and the most fish we hooked at a time was 10 fish, but we never moved far before we hooked up more.  It appears that the fish are loaded up on the edge, with most of them on the inside edge of the slower moving water.  Their isn’t much of a color change but you will have no problem seeing the edge of the current, the rip sticks out like a sore thumb.  I would recommend using the smallest ballyhoo as possible and any small feathers or chuggers.  The fish are small so use smaller baits to help your hookup ratio.

The reef fishing is still kind of slow, but if you put your time in you can manage a good catch of snappers and there are plenty of groupers too.  I had out one of the scientists that is currently doing the grouper research in the Gulf and he was telling me that they have been working hard to get the research done so they can make a decision on the grouper closer.  He was telling me that the groupers have a 20% mortality when they are released.  The way they figure this out is to catch a bunch of groupers and then put them back down in the water in a cage.  Then they come back at different intervals to check how many groupers have died.  The research still points to the decline of the gag groupers in the gulf but the red population is fine.  Hopefully they will open the season on time, but I have serious doubts.

Way offshore the hump has been steady, with plenty of tunas and amberjacks.  Live bait and jigging are the best methods for getting bigger fish and if you happen to get out there on an overcast day the bite has been even better.  My favorite colors for the jigs are chartreuse and pink; I don’t own any other colors.  Well that’s, a lie, I have some purple ones but I haven’t used them in quite some time now.  The 5-7 oz. Stick jigs work the best.  You don’t have to buy shimano but if you want to spend more money for the same results then go for it.  I generally start my drift just before the rise on the hump, which is like 700 feet of water, and this usually gives me an idea where they are holding up that day.  Sometimes I will head out to 800 feet of water, which is pretty far away from the hump and drop down really deep to get the bigger ones.  If you try this on top of the hump your chances of hooking an amberjack on light tackle is sure to happen.

Deep dropping has been good for the brave fisherman who have been heading out to the 650’s and beyond.  I did really well early this week and got a few snowys, tiles, rosefish, and barrels too.  The queen snapper season is over for the most part, but there are a few stragglers left behind.

Good luck this week and keep safe.

This week I spent a lot of time offshore, which was very productive as long as you fished the humps and deep dropped on ledges.  The humps from Islamorada to Marathon have been packed with boats.  The tuna and amberjack bite has been red hot.  There have been much bigger amberjacks on the Islamorada Hump but still plenty of them on the Marathon hump to put any tackle you have to the test.  The tunas have been smoking hot and their size has been good with many fish from 10 pounds and up.  I only caught small ones when we pulled feathers.  I only did that to get small ones for bait, the amberjacks love small tunas.  You can fish them live or dead, but if you fish them live make sure you use enough lead to take them down three hundred feet to where the amberjacks are holding.  It is better to have more lead than less, the tunas are hard swimmers and three pounds may seem like a lot but it will get the tuna down to the amberjacks.  Using larger baits will ensure that you can get some of the largest fish out of this gigantic biomass of amberjacks that inhabit the hump.

The dolphin have been almost nonexistent, but there have been a few caught inside of 200 feet and some caught around floating debris out in the 600’s.  With the water temperature in the low 70’s the dolphin will not be found in any numbers.  I don’t know if it is just me but I can’t wait for the temps to rise, I am looking for the first push of dolphin.  It probably won’t happen until the end of April but we can only hope.

The shallow wrecks have been over run with large amberjacks, and the word got out, the well-known wrecks looked like a parking lot.  Everyone has been jockeying for the best position on the wrecks.  Being in the right area of the wreck makes a whole lot of difference between catching and watching the boat next to you catching.

Reef fishing hasn’t changed much, it is still kind of slow for the most part, but the patches to the west of the seven mile bridge are producing a bounty of groupers and snappers.  Most of the snappers are small muttons, and yellowtails with a few big mangrove snappers thrown in the mix.

The bay is full of mackerel, snappers, and groupers.  Fishing the large deepwater grass beds near banks have produced for me very well.  It doesn’t matter where you are, the mackerel will find you with a good chum slick.    The best areas are about 7-10 miles strait out in front of the Seven Mile Bridge.  Spoons and jig-n-shrimp combo works well too.

Get out there and fish and if you enjoy fishing please sign the petition to ensure that our favorite past time is still here to pass on to our kids.  The web site for the petition is here.

The yellowtails on the reef are still sluggish, but the mangroves that have been on the patches have been day savers.  Speaking of day savers the kingfish which are most often overlooked can give your light tackle a good run for it’s money.  Drag screaming off of a reel gets every fisherman’s blood flowing.  These toothy critters love this weather and as the water cleared up the bite was really on.  Kingfish rely on their great eyesight to eat.  They have very large eyes for their size.  Kingfish have a torpedo shaped body, which allows them to have incredible acceleration to surprise its prey.  One of the many reasons I love to fish for kings is their ability to launch themselves out of the water and land directly on your bait.  Sometimes kingfish can jump twenty feet in the air when they attack bait on the surface.  These supersonic jet –like predators can eat very large baits, as they will cut larger baits down to size as they shred apiece off on every pass.  You can target these fish on deeper wrecks from 125-180 feet of water.  If there are barracudas around the wreck the kings will stay further off the wreck so not to be eaten themselves.  You can troll for them with live or dead bait along the edge of the reef or anchor up and chunk for them as well.  When you’re anchored up try the kite with a large bait and some flatlines with live baits for the best results.  They will readily eat a spoon or jig retrieved very fast.  These fish are triggered to attack by fast moving action.

Sail fishing has been a little on the boring side.  The current still hasn’t been all that great and this eddy of no current was shortly interrupted for a few days as we did experience some current this week.  The bite for sails has been slow all the way up to Miami.  When we get some current we will see the action pick back up.  There were a few dolphin caught along the reef this week, nothing of any size or numbers but a few is better than none.  I heard from one of my friends that a large school of schoolies cam by their boat, but they were too small to keep.  If I had to go offshore this upcoming week I would venture out to the humps where the action has been with tuna and amberjacks.  The super large jacks have held up residence on the hump and so has many large sharks too.  The jacks out there have been averaging 65-80 pounds with some 100 pounders being caught too.

For the up coming week, it looks like we are going to experience cooler waters only in front of Marathon and as far out as 30 miles, but later in the week it will be pushed out by the warm water eddy and the warm water looks like it will push almost to the reef.  When we loose the cooler water the Upper Keys will get it for a few days until it pushes around the corner to Miami.  Look for warm water East or West till Thursday and then we should have some current and warm water for a few days until a new eddy of cold water will plague us once again.  All of this cooler water is being pushed by the warm water out of the Gulf of Mexico and creating a Ying and a Yang mixture of cold and warm water along the Keys.  This warm water is swirling the cold water up the coast and this is why we will be experiencing these changes of water temperatures.

I am counting the days till the dolphin run, but I am predicting that it won’t be until the end of April or the beginning of May before we see any major runs, but I hope I am wrong.  This was the trend last year, and the only way that we will see the dolphin return early is if we experience some global warming, hahahaha, just kidding, but seriously, we need the warm water for the dolphin to show up early.  And everyone hated El Nino, but I think that’s why we had loads of dolphin from March to October.  I had amazing Octobers in the past when the water stayed warm late in the season.  Keep your eyes peeled for birds working anywhere near the warm water for dolphin.  Good luck out there.

This week was a bit rough, which limited the amount of people that should have been out there.  Fishing in 4-6 foot seas on the reef and wrecks I was able to keep my clients thinking about their next bite instead of their stomachs.  The wrecks were very active with muttons, groupers, and amberjacks.  Using vertical jigs and live bait you were very likely to stay very busy with multiple double headers and line screaming off of the fifty pound spinners I use for dropping.  I find that most people are more comfortable with spinners and you can let beginners who are enthusiastic about fishing get experience with a fishing combo that is user friendly.  I had a charter this week where catching blue runners became a challenge for them, but after filling the well with blue runners they were able to try for the big ones on a little bit bigger tackle.  After bouncing around out there we lost two anglers to seasickness, but the other two caught some slob amberjacks on a lighter combo.  Women especially, find lighter tackle easier even though it might take longer to land a big fish, you need to have some common sense to understand that most women are not as strong as men and to use heavy tackle with strong drags is just not going to happen.  So next time when you are out there dropping for amberjacks and other bottom fish, give the lady a spinner and make her day.

The reef has been ok, yellowtails have been biting somewhat, but the lack of current has really affected the bite.  They have been hitting softly and closer to the bottom due to the dirty water and lack of current.   Yellowtails are funny sometimes, but it makes complete sense.  If the water is dirty the yellowtail will not come up high in the water column for the one reason, they need to see the bottom.  If they have a hard time seeing the bottom they will hold deeper in the water column.  Sometimes when they are really hungry they will come up and go down, never staying on top.  When your school of yellowtail won’t come up, you will loose more fish due to their ability to find something to wrap your line around since they are so close to the bottom.  They can be smart by swimming towards the boat but diving deeper as they find something to hang you up on.  The other reason when the yellowtails get hard to get to the boat when they are deeper in the water column is that the threat of being eaten by sharks and kingfish increases with every ten feet down in the water column.  As the fish struggles on the line the kings and sharks are able to pick these fish out and eat them with ease.  Even dolphin (flipper) will take their fair share of your fish while you’re out there yellow tailing.

Sail fishing has been ok, with some captains getting 3-7 releases, and capturing some big kings in the 20-30 pound range.  Lots of schooling kings from 8-12 pounds have been swarming around some of the wrecks in 130-180 feet of water.   Using vertical jigs, live bait and dead bait has been working really well.  You can also get out off the edge of the reef and troll with down riggers or weights and have a blast catching kingfish.  They might not be very good to eat, but I do enjoy catching them.  They are one of our sportfish that most people overlook.  If you use the right tackle these toothy critters are sure to pull hard and test your tackle, especially if your using light tackle.  Fishing foe kings in the Kite is so much fun.  This is by far some of the most exciting way to kingfish as they skyrocket twenty feet into the air with the bait in their mouth.  If you have ever bass fished using top-water plugs, the excitement you get when the fish busts your floating lure making a big splash and surprising you at the same time drives these fisherman to stick with it.  The same thing with kite fishing for kings, the aerial attacks and the strike is the number one reason for fishing this way.

Have a great week, and get out there and have some fun.  Try something new this week, and try kite fishing for kings while we have the weather for it.

The wrecks have been hit or miss, but when you do find one that is producing, stick with it. That was the case this week, as I hit six to seven different wrecks to finally find one that was producing. Most of what we caught was large to medium amberjacks from 30-50 pounds. On a spinner with 50 pound braid the fight is unforgettable for my clients. Whether you call them bulldogs of the deep or reef donkeys, amberjacks are a formidable opponent on light gear. Using only 40-pound leader the drag on my rods are set fairly light to allow the fish to run, and that’s why I love to fish this way. Anyone can drop down heavy tackle on a conventional reel, but what most people love about catching big fish is to watch the line scream off the reel. I do lose fish because my tackle is lighter than most, but that’s fishing, you can’t catch them all, and if we did, fishing would be too predictable and maybe become a little boring. In between the jack attacks we took our fair share of some nice size muttons in the 12-15 pound range. A few mystery fish which we couldn’t stop, which I thought they might have been big grouper, because they went strait for the wreck and stopped running once they got there.

The reef has been hot, where most people are catching some pretty large mangroves, yellowtail, and muttons. I talked to my buddy Johnny who is an avid free diver and said the groupers are all over the place. John proceeded to tell me an astounding story about his latest dive. After shooting a couple of muttons, he shot another only to have it pull free from his spear when out of nowhere four groupers of all sizes came in to maul the wounded mutton. They watched in awe to the aggressive behavior these groupers were exhibiting. He told me it reminded him of a pride of lions attacking a gazelle on the African plains. To bad he didn’t have his video camera to document these obviously hungry groupers. Johnny had said that his whole group saw a hundred grouper though out the day which would mean that maybe the spawn is on. I am upset we can’t enjoy this fishery, mainly I can understand why they want to close the season, but completely shutting down the season is a little much. It would have been handled better if we had a restriction on how many we can keep during the spawn, but the total shut down is outrageous.

Sail fishing was pretty normal this week with many fish caught and released. The ballyhoo had disappeared due to the dirty water. Finding them on the ocean side was real a challenge, but when this happens venture out to the bay and chum along some of the banks, three miles out and or in front of the Seven Mile Bridge. Be careful back there, there are many banks and you don’t want to end up on the bank or destroying the grass growing on them either. The bite was sporadic throughout the day but the bite is determined by the time and the amount of bait in the area. So look for bait, and find a nice drop off and get yourself a sail today.

Offshore there have been some reports of dolphin and wahoo, so go back to the basics and pull some high speeders. Finding dolphin this time of year can be challenging, but you won’t have to go far, look for weed lines and rips inside of ten miles. I am sure the deep dropping was good, but I didn’t talk to anyone who went out in these conditions to test their boat and their sea legs. I can’t wait till I can get back out there, dinner is much better with queen snapper on the table verses mutton snapper, but mutton will do when there is no queen snapper to be had.

Get out when you can, but make sure you are to date on all the new fishing regulations, and make sure your boat is equipped with all the required safety equipment too, the Coast Guard will appreciate that. Till next week, happy hunting.

Sail fishing has been as hot as it can get from the showers in the shallows to the packs of sails tailing down sea off the edge of the reef. I haven’t been sail fishing this week but, from what I gathered from my friends and other charter captains, it is good out there, really good. Using live bait will generally always be better than trolling dead bait, but one of my friend got three sails on dead bait, along with some dolphin and blackfin tuna. There are many different ways to fish for sails down here, so pick the best way you know how and go get some. When the wind blows you shouldn’t let it get you down, you can always anchor up on the reef.

The reef has been producing some quality yellowtails from 45-60 feet of water. While your fishing for your yellowtails, put out a kite with a blue runner or a yellowtail for a chance of a smoker king or wahoo. When your chumming and you have a big school of fish behind your boat, there will be some other predatory fish lurking back there for an easy meal. If your chum is going the same direction as the wind, add a couple of big split shots your kite. This will allow your kite to veer to one side or the other. You don’t want your kite bait back in your yellowtail school for two reasons. The first reason is that it might scare your school of yellowtail, and by placing it amongst all the other fish it may get lost amongst the school of yellowtails. So if you get your kite to skirt to the outside of the school it will be an easy target by the predators. Most predators will attack a bait that gets separated from its school first. I also would recommend that you make your kite go to the side closer to the deeper water. When we have North winds you may not even need any split shots if the current is strong enough. Try out this method, it really works. If you never have used a kite and feel intimidated with it, hire me to run your boat for the day, I will teach you how to work the kite and many other methods, which all of us captains use down here.

Wreck fishing has been really good; many different species are being caught in the deeper water. Amberjacks seem to be on all the wrecks, but if you are persistent you might get yourself some nice muttons that have been in the 10-18 pound range. Groupers have been biting well, but unfortunately we will have to release all of them due to the new grouper regulations. The bait has been easier to catch as the warm water returns to the shallows.

Deep dropping is on fire, from snowy grouper to queen snappers. Some tilefish are being caught and of course the barrels have been biting as well. I like to use cut bait and squid when I am deep dropping, it gives them a choice, even fish like a choice. Swords are biting but if you are as unlucky like we were this last trip you can fight a sword for a couple hours only to have a shark eat it before you can get it in. I swear that it was a jumbo because he fought really hard the whole time, and usually when they fight hard on the bottom, it’s a big one. Large swordfish do one of two things when you hook one. They will fight hard and stay down for many hours or fire up to surface faster than you can reel in the line. We had numerous bites and hook ups, but the fish were just coming unglued on this trip. Well I guess that’s why they call it fishing and not catching. The more frustrating thing was that my friend Capt Will Wagner fishing right next to me landed two fish. My mother told me there would be days like this.

Have a great week, and catch some fish!