Recent offshore fishing reports from the Florida Keys region.
Islamorada Action
Florida Sportsman member: Captain Easy
We wound up catching two sailfish, a nice black grouper, a mutton snapper, a few kingfish, and best of all a triple header of 30 to 40 pound wahoo on 16 pound spinning tackle. The wahoo flurry was quite the sight. We hooked the first one on a live cigar minnow on the down rod, It bit while we were winding it up to check the bait.
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Dolphin in Close
Florida Sportsman member: Teamteke
With rain storms solid offshore, we worked the shallow 220 to 270 foot depths where the scattered weeds held the dolphin. NOAA said the gulf stream was only two miles off of Sombrero light. We did venture out to about 500 feet and found a one degree rise in the water temp.
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Dolphin in the Weeds
Florida Sportsman member: flbluerunner
We did have a big one on but could not keep him from loading up on weeds and coming unwound. Funny thing, it was raining and if I got out of the rain the bite shut off, so we fished in the rain, and I took pellet beating in the tower.
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Speed Jigging Fun
Florida Sportsman member: Tavernierguy
The guys I had aboard jig from Kayaks all day, so they had it dialed. Bite was at the low tide then just kept getting and better has the tide started to move. Caught a wide variety of fish and few “fish heads”.
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Good Bite Out Deep
Florida Sportsman member: INTREPID377
The most excitement we had was a when a school of juvenile sailfish began tearing up the spread. We had five lines hit in addition to both teasers. Finally, after running around in circles from rod to rod, we got one to stick on the Wide Range moldcraft in the shotgun position. He wasn’t very big, but he was a sailfish.
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Fun in the Marquesas
Florida Sportsman member: Captbernie
Just back from a week in Key West with my wife and son. We had outstanding weather,fishing and diving. We spent four out of the six days fishing, diving and exploring the Marquesas. Limited on bugs daily and caught/speared enough fish for eats each day.
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Marathon Reef Fishing
Florida Sportsman member: miami mutton
The ballyhoos are on the reef but the speedos are a gamble, one day, they are at the bag and the next they are lost. Grouper have been biting good on speedos and live horse hoos and some nice muttons have fallen for those same baits.
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A Keys Adventure
Florida Sportsman member: Fish Tails
We stopped to check some fishy rips and a smaller weed line but Captain didn’t like the color of the water. And right about 28 miles off shore there it was. The mother of all weed lines, beautiful blue water and lines were in. Not three minutes later the starboard short goes off and my boy is on his first dolphin.
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Keys Trip with the Kids
Florida Sportsman member: FlagMaster
Forum member FlagMaster and kids enjoyed a recent trip to the keys. Big grouper, mutton and yellowtail snapper filled the cooler, as well as hogfish taken via speargun.
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Florida Keys Offshore
Florida Sportsman member: Gary M
We also had a pretty good bite with the yellowtail snappers. I tend to fish for them more than the heavy gear on the bottom and on this trip I got nice fish up to 23 1/2 inches. Fat ones too and on my light spinner, it was just a blast.
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Epic Trip to Pulley Ridge
Florida Sportsman member: cudaman
A lot of screaming reels all over the boat with double hook ups, up to quad hookups, the over under screaming of the mates could be heard from one end of the boat to the other as the mixed bag of fish started flooding the decks. Some bonitas (little tunny) found their way into the mix and a regular scene to happen of the days of fishing.
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Find the Birds, Find the Fish
Florida Sportsman member: seamonkey23
We then decided to run and gun. I saw 2 or 3 birds that were joined by 3 or 4 more circling something, so dropped the baits. We watched the birds circle back to our baits and as soon as I mentioned that, we hooked up on the bigger bull and cow.
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Night Time is the Right Time
Florida Sportsman member: PBG POOLGUY
The mangrove bite was red hot! Got out a couple hours before dark, had the chum flowing and picked at some smaller snappers and managed a nice rock hind, but when the sun went down it was on! All the big whitebait you wanted in the light all night long, bug a bait, drop it down and bam!
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Keys Offshore Bite
Florida Sportsman member: Got Ta Go
Dolphin have been holding mostly between 500-750′. I won’t say they have been easy, but if you keep working at it in the grass you’ll put together a nice catch. Seems they’ve been wanting meat, as most my catches have been coming on ballyhoo with or without skirts.
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Tearing Up the Tortugas
Florida Sportsman member: Gary M
It was a matter of picking off a few nice fish, move to another spot and repeat throughout the trip. But we did have a wild snapper bite that gave us a very busy hour at sundown the first night!
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Islamorada Offshore Variety
Florida Sportsman member: Captain Easy
Dolphin fishing has really picked up for us over the past week down here in Islamorada. Every day has been a little different, and it can still be a little hit or miss, but we had a few outstanding trips over the weekend.
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The Gift of Dolphin
Florida Sportsman member: kajo
We headed out to 650 feet, put out a few trolling rigs and hooked up pretty fast. We got some schoolies in the cooler and after hooking 4 we saw a mass of flying fish blast out of the water a little ways away and a second later a huge mahi mauling them.
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Keys Trip Success
Florida Sportsman member: stoutner
We went back out Thursday afternoon and found a nice solid weedline in about 650-700 feet of water. Trolled up to it and as soon as we arrived we were doubled up on Dolphin. Stopped trolling and started to chunk up that Bonito to bring the school to us.
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Day Saving Tuna
Florida Sportsman member:flbluerunner
Decided to go Southwest, there were broken weeds the whole way. Got out about 28 miles off and found birds were everywhere.
It was a big school of blackfins,and we were able to catch all we wanted. Kept 3 nice ones and let the rest go.
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Working for the Fish
Florida Sportsman member: Gulf2Back2Front
Weed formations were key with the occasional dolphin jumping to confirm our aspirations. These were caught mostly on Billy Bait and our own techniques for getting more.
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Islamorada Grouper
Florida Sportsman member: Captain Easy
So we ditched the reef fishing plan and headed off to power drift on some deeper wrecks. In addition to the grouper there were also lots of amberjack and jack crevalle on many of the wrecks. I did notice a lot of pressure on the reef and wrecks. It was hard to find a spot not covered up with either boats hook and line fishing or divers spearfishing.
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Islamorada Day and Night
Florida Sportsman member: jcuilla
Our guests were some long time anglers in the area and Uncle Ted, the brother of Robbie, as in Robbie’s Marina. Awesome guy! Toward the end of the trip the short line gets slammed and it’s game on!
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Catching in the Marquesas
Florida Sportsman member: heavychevy15
Fished the Marquesas and got some decent fish out there this past weekend. We caught yellow tail, muttons, red snapper, some other bi-catch, and a handful of grouper (that all went back).
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Permit, Cobia and a Surprise
Florida Sportsman member: NauticalWheeler
The real surprise at this location was when I saw a small shark with interesting markings cruising around the boat. I thought it might resemble a tiger shark, but wasn’t sure. I threw out a live bait in haste and was only using 40 pound mono for a leader and was lucky to not get bitten off, but the hook was right in the corner of the mouth.
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Islamorada Wahoo and More
Florida Sportsman member: Captain Easy
We had about a 45 minute flurry with at least one wahoo on the whole time. We wound up catching 4 out of 8 and had as many as 3 wahoo fighting over baits at once just 20 feet behind the boat including a couple the skyrocketed about 8 feet out of the water chasing the baits.
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Shallow Water Fun
Florida Sportsman member: Jciulla
Here’s a few pics from this week in patch reefs from 18-22 feet. Lots of good action from mangroves, muttons and mackerel. It seems like the fish are starting to go back to hitting the cut bait more as well as the live shrimp.
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Catching Fish on the Drift
Florida Sportsman member: youngguns2
We wanted to fill the box so decided to fish all wire on the top and mid rods and immediately had a triple on sailfish on the first set up. With only two people on board and wire leader, you can imagine the chaos that ensued but we did manage to land one out of the three.
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Fishing the Patches
Florida Sportsman member: Captain Easy
We had a great day patch fishing today. Fishing the patches about a half mile inside the edge of the reef. The water was completely mudded over with the strong southwest wind we had last night. That and a moderate northeast current made for some great patch fishing conditions. We wound up with a few dozen nice yellowtail, some hogfish, porgies, and a half dozen muttons including some really nice ones.
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Mack Attack
Florida Sportsman member: piner_wahoo
Forum member piner_wahoo got into some nice fish offshore, fishing in his flats boat. Big kingfish and snapper should make for some excellent fillets and fish dip!
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Islamorada Deep Dropping
Florida Sportsman member: Captain Easy
The kings made for some fast action and after catching our limit of them on cigar minnows just offshore of the reef. We then headed offshore and spent the rest of the day bottom dropping in depths from 400 to 800 feet deep. We wound up with an excellent catch of yellow eye snapper, vermillion snapper, queen snapper, tilefish, and a couple of beautiful yellow edge grouper up to 30 pounds.
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Keys Mixed Bag
Florida Sportsman member: TeamTeke
Along the way we set out a dolphin spread of four Billy Baits. Luckily I put out one that had some wire on it as it got slammed by a nice wahoo. Others suggested at hookup that it was just a skipjack tuna but this fish was pulling some serious drag and did not want to come in. Finally getting it closer Harry yelled from the upper helm that it was a good wahoo. Bingo!
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Duck Key Reef Report
Florida Sportsman member: TeamTeke
Albert takes the first drift. Only one angler drifts at a time. At a moderate distance back he gets a run-off and hook up which produced a nice mangrove snapper. My wife Tania and myself each took our turns having bites and landing fish also. I think Albert went 7 or 8 fish straight without a miss.
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Summerland Key Offshore
Florida Sportsman member: Death From Above
The weather was still good so we went for it one more time. Picked up some nice dolphin on another weedline and then the big hoo shows up. Hit a blue and with Islander with a rigged ballyhoo. The bait was rigged with mono so it was a little tense until he hit the deck.
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Fun Weekend in the Keys
Florida Sportsman member: Lori Jo Fishing
Cayden’s on the reel, gets him boat side and the phin goes crazy. Then the captain sees more phins and says get some more baits out. Me and Jeff hook up and we ended up catching all three.
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Tavernier Tuna and Dolphin
Florida Sportsman member: TavernierGuy
Found dolphin all afternoon and into the evening. Dolphin were on small current rips and slicks. Found a couple on small white birds. Fish were between 270 to 350 feet for me. They were in closer as well, but found the best action in that depth so I stuck with it.
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Tearin’ Up the Tortugas
Florida Sportsman member: cudaman
In the morning I started jigging and was able to connect with a red grouper, a story that would repeat over and over about 20 times. On this trip the ged groupers seemed to like jigs slowly jigged near the bottom.
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Mixed Bag off Islamorada
Florida Sportsman member: EarlyBird
We managed to hook three and land two 40 pound hoo’s. My guests then looked at me and says, “Capt let’s head on in because we can’t top this” and I happily took her on in. We ended the day with 7 wahoos, 40 mahi, 2 tripletail, and a dozen tunas.
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Day Timing off Duck Key
Florida Sportsman member: out of the blue
We were now 5 for 6 on the day and we deployed once more and as we were near the end of the drift, there was the unmistakable tap. We went to work, he felt heavy all the way up so we were thinking it was foul hooked or a shark.
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Slayin’ Them Solo
Florida Sportsman member: TavernierGuy
Went solo today looking for a phins and maybe wahoo and the fish were hungry! The bull and the cow crashed the baits at the same time. Cow hit the wire leader and the bull smacked the mono. 20 minutes later put them over the rail, thankfully the seas were flat. Both ate blue and white islanders.
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Limiting Out
Florida Sportsman member: miami mutton
I started the usual chum slick to find the yellowtails eating right behind the motors. The guys took pictures and were excited to begin the catching, which they did just that, in a short time we had our limit and a mutton on the bottom to make the 50 snapper limit.
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Fishing on the Edge
Florida Sportsman member: ShallowSalt
Biggest score of the week was a 19.5 pound blackfin tuna caught on 20 pound spin gear while drifting. We began to see the big boys skying about a quarter mile behind the boat and eventually they worked their way close enough and took a drifting bait behind the boat.
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Islamorada Offshore
Florida Sportsman member: INTREPID377
Based on what we saw, if you want a shot at a dolphin, you’re going to need to run a bit. I know some bigger dolphin were caught in close, but no real numbers. If you want blackfin tuna, both the 409 and Islamorada Hump were loaded with small fish.
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Catching in Key Largo
Florida Sportsman member: Joepilot
Dolphin were abundant about 10 to 17 miles off Key Largo. The ocean was glass and no one around to compete with. The edge of the stream was clearly visible in these condition, which was really interesting to see so defined.
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Keys Swords
Florida Sportsman member: out of the blue
We went to work and after a short battle placed a 50 incher on the deck. My spell had been broken and it was my buddy’s turn, unfortunately we pulled the hook on the next bite and then we caught a big mako in 1700 feet of water, we let that one go as it was only 1130 am and no point on putting that on the deck.
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Pulley Ridge Trip
Florida Sportsman member: Xaf
Greg said we could go ahead and load our gear. So we lugged all the above mentioned gear from the truck to the boat. Then it was off to the Hogfish for a bowl of lobster bisque and an order of hogfish fingers. Soon the rest of the anglers for the trip started showing up and went through the ritual of loading their gear on the boat. Finally it was 8 pm and time to shove off.
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Dry Tortugas Trip
Florida Sportsman member: Gary M
We all agreed the next morning that none of us had ever seen such a long, hot bite of such consistently BIG yellowtails! Even Ed, who fishes for yellowtails a lot in the Bahamas, was having a hard time remembering such great action over in the islands.
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Little Torch Key Mixed Bag
Florida Sportsman member: punchdog
It was getting to be early evening so we decided to troll back in and saw a frigate at about 600 feet. Followed him for a short while and a schoolie mahi hits a lure. As we are bringing him in 3 or 4 big mahi are following. Avery, who is 12, grabs a pitch rod, puts a pinfish on the big circle hook, tosses it out and hooks the 47 inch cow. About 20 minutes later, good gaff shot and it is in the boat.
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Deep Dropping and Dolphin off Key Largo
Florida Sportsman member: Veikx
We set up a drift, and put down some bonita chunks. First pull up 3 roses, we were ecstatic! We did two more drops with 3 rosies each time. Afterward we continued to troll and found a nice log in 650 feet. This was loaded with schoolies, most of them were right at 20 inches but we landed 5 that were 22 plus inches. Many were thrown back to get bigger.
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Dinosaur Dolphin off Key Largo
Florida Sportsman member: SeaCarrII
Around 12:30 pm, we came up on a frigate tracking fish from about 30 yards up, with bait splashing below. Followed him for a few minutes, and our two trolled ballyhoo got hit. About a 30 pound cow jumped and spit the hook, but this bull came aboard after a long fight. It hit a green skirted ballyhoo in 670 feet, about 17 or 18 miles out.
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First Phin in the Box
Florida Sportsman member: SonarSup
Looked for weed lines and birds and didn’t find any. A lot of sargasso patches but no distinct weed lines to troll up and down. I trolled around 5 knots when I hit the 330 foot mark my drag started screaming. About 5 minutes later my wife and I got the fish in the boat. 20 pound 40 inch first dolphin for my wife and I!
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Big Pine Offshore
Florida Sportsman member: AMPED
We went out to about 625 feet today, East of Big Pine Key & West of Sombrero Light. We caught some really nice phins (triple header), some peanuts which were tagged and released, average size wahoo, a black fin tuna, and some cudas. Left at 8am and was back by 3:00 pm.
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Mahi in Marathon
Florida Sportsman member: CatchDog
Forum member CatchDog has been on the dolphin off of Marathon. Catching many fish trolling naked and skirted ballyhoo between 630 and 750 feet. The big bull was taken on a blue and white islander.
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Tearing up Tavernier
Florida Sportsman member: TavernierGuy
Reef bite has been ok when the current cooperates. Been having some fun catching and releasing Permit. Got to do some grouper fishing on Sunday May 4 for the first time in along while. First drop we took a nice black grouper for dinner!
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Gettin’ Jiggy in the Keys
Florida Sportsman member: Captain Easy
On Saturday we took out Greg, George, Eric, Jomal, and Lynn and released 32 amberjacks all between 30 and 75 pounds as well as a dozen almaco jacks and banded rudderfish. These guys are a group of vertical jiggers from Miami and loosely refer to themselves as the “Miami wrecking crew”.
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Lower Keys Cobes
Florida Sportsman member: Bill Welder
We kept the first 3 and released number 4 and passed on number 5. We could have taken more.They ate whatever we threw at them. My clients also kept about a dozen yellowtails between 18 to 20 inches. Sharks are thick. We leadered a large Bull shark after a 45 minute tug of war. Only saw 2 Sportfishers all day.
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Tavernier Slammers
Florida Sportsman member: youngguns2
Found a nice bucket with bait but no mahi, then came across a nice piece of bamboo with heavy mono tied to it with again lots of bait and a triple tail but no mahi. Kept running southwest till about 11:30 am when we spotted a hawk heading down on the water in 750 feet and it was chaos from then on. With only 3 guys on the boat, we got covered by 3 large slammers, hooked all 3 fish but ended up landing the bull and the smaller cow.
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Awesome Trip on the Yankee Capts
Florida Sportsman member: LitiGATOR
The mate gaffed the fish and a beautiful mutton hit the deck. I don’t know if Juozas had ever caught one before, but I believe it was his first on the Yankee. At 10-years old, on his first trip out here. That’s impressive. You couldn’t wipe the smile of his face.
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Lower Keys Reef Bite
Florida Sportsman member: Apnatic
Decided that was enough mutton meat for us so we headed in a little shallower to a wreck in 100 feet to get some tails. After sandballing for about 45 minutes we had as much as I could keep and give away to a few buddies.
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Little Bit of Everything Out of Islamorada
Florida Sportsman member: Captain Easy
The deep dropping has been spectacular when the conditions have been right for it. Mostly a mix of queen snapper and nice blueline tilefish with some snowy grouper mixed in. I think I’ve probably seen more queen snapper this winter than I have in years. The queens and bigger tiles have been in 600 to 800 feet of water while there have been yelloweye snapper, and some nice vermillions in the 400 feet depths.
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Staying in the Fish on the Yankee Captain
Florida Sportsman member: cameronsleep
Capt Greg motored us to a canyon with current. Golden tile fish, barrel fish and numerous other fishies appeared, then the highlight, queen snappers! I was lucky and nailed on of the largest of these beauties, almost as big as the one I caught last summer. What a climax to the trip! About eight or ten were landed, including one that came unhooked and was floating away. Greg got us to reel in and went on a recovery mission. You don’t abandon a beauty like that!
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Deep Dropping Off Cudjoe Key
Florida Sportsman member: urbanRenewal
We only had a few hours due to prior commitments but we ran out deep and rigged up while we figured out the drift. We made one pass over the structure, adjusted and quickly into the next pass it was game on. Jeff, with some help from Bugsy, got to work.
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Big Blackfins off Big Pine
Florida Sportsman member: piner_wahoo
Forum member piner_wahoo Caught some monster blackfin tuna on live bait in the lower keys recently. Some anglers can’t decide what is better, the fight of these awesome fish, or the filets!
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Going Gulf Side
Florida Sportsman member: Got TA Go
Was a little bumpy on the south side when we left the dock, so I was glad that we were headed to the Gulf. Stopped by the airport marker to get some Pilchards for the live well, and they were there. After sabiking some up we headed for the Gulf. Sad to say that we didn’t find and Cobia, but conditions were awesome. Flat calm seas, clear skies.
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Down South Dolphin
Florida Sportsman member: Bill Welder
Just looking for birds, we stumbled on a weed line that was clean on the north edge and ran for a couple miles on the edge of the Ups and Downs. We were in 575 feet at daylight and never saw another boat. Only a fool would troll that deep this time of the year for dolphin. Gentle breeze changed to the east and the bite was over. We were back by 11AM. Mark and I ended up with 8 dolphin to 24 pounds.
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Sails and Tails
Florida Sportsman member: SaltwaterSportswoman
The bait used today were goggle eyes. While drifting we fished the bottom rod and hooked up to some mutton snapper and small sharks. We also caught some yellowtail snapper on the patches. The first sailfish came up on one of the baits mid-day and had a successful release. The next sailfish came up on the long bait about 30 minutes later and unfortunately unhooked during the fight.
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Great Way To End The Year
Florida Sportsman member: Captain Easy
Paul, the angler who caught it paid his dues big time for this one. He stayed out and got soaked for over an hour fighting this fish on 20# spinning tackle. With the rain pouring down and some pretty big waves breaking over the stern while we where backing down. I was afraid we might lose him overboard one time.
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Wintertime Wahoo
Florida Sportsman member: TavernierGuy
My wife and I went to the reef yesterday morning on Christmas Eve. We went 1 for 3 on wahoo. Fish were eating in 190 feet of water. Caught on red/black on the down bait over dead ballyhoo, trolling 7 knots. Got the one we wanted!
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Big Pine Fishing
Florida Sportsman member: dihrd
Most of the fishing has happened from the protection of land. We have caught lots of small to keeper mangrove snapper, and grouper around bridges. Some of the best spots have been deep holes in channels where we have caught good numbers of muttons and red grouper with several keepers.
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Reef Fishing Off Key Largo
Florida Sportsman member: Gary M
The next time the bottom rod when off, I knew that I had a real fish. When I finally saw “pink”, I no doubt grinned as it was my favorite fish, a nice Mutton Snapper. I netted him and he measured out at 19 inches. The fish box instantly got a lot better looking!
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“Grouper Bombs” Off Tavernier
Florida Sportsman member: TavernierGuy
The black grouper bite continues to produce for my clients who want to target them. Finding them between 60 to75 feet. Took A couple guys from Missouri last week in for a short reef “meat” trip. They made one request prior to the trip, catch a black grouper for dinner. Caught a mess of tails then switched over to dropping “grouper bombs”. Went 1 for 3 then headed in with a grouper for dinner.
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Putting A Legend On The Fish
Florida Sportsman member: CaptainGeoffrey
Today we had a real treat, Captain Tred Barta on the boat. We caught 15 tunas, handful of medium Mahi, and a sail!
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Tallying Up The Tile Fish Down South
Florida Sportsman member: urbanRenewel
Yesterday afternoon we targeted Wahoo without success. Today, with reports of slim pickings on pelagics offshore, light winds and little current we kept the trolling gear in the racks and opted to deep drop. 6 tilefish later we headed home after a successful ‘Plan B”, 27 inches being the biggest.
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Keys Offshore Producing
Florida Sportsman member: TavernierGuy
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