Summer Fun

Report Date: August 1, 2013

Over the past month I had an opportunity to travel to Bermuda to fish the triple crown marlin tournaments. The three competitions consist of the Billfish Blast, Bermuda Billlfish Classic, and the Seahorse. These are the most prestigious tournaments in the world with the best boats and crew that money can buy. Bermuda is known for holding the biggest blue marlin in the world.
While I was in Bermuda we fished 20 days. We caught 10-28 blue marlin and 3 white marlin. Do to some bad luck during the first two weeks we went 1-18 on blue marlin. The last week , our luck changed and we caught 9 blue marlin up to 600lb. Unfortunately we didn’t do anything in the tournaments but we still had a good time with a great group of guys.

  Before I left to Bermuda I guided a handful of trips starting in the middle of June.

On June 14 our crew participated in a small dolphin tournament held out of Key Biscayne. There were 60 boats fishing. We started the day heading south east of fowey light. With in the first twenty minutes we hit our first school. There were a hundred plus mahis swimming around frantically, eating everything in sight. The majority were small ones, so we decided to move on. A few hours later we hit 5 more schools of 100-300 fish. The dolphin were everywhere. We ended the day catching our limit, with the biggest one being 17 lbs. To finish the tournament our boat weighed in 78lbs of dolphin, which gave us the first place position for combined weight.

  After the dolphin excursion I had a bottom fishing trip with some Russian clients I take out on a regular basis. We started out the morning fishing the inlet of Govt Cut. The action was good. We caught a half dozen jack crevelles up to 10 lbs and then left in hope for some bigger critters. Our next plan of attack was to hit some deep ship wrecks in leu of some snapper or grouper. Unfortunately we did not catch any of the target species but we did keep the rod bent with six almaco jacks up to 38 lbs. We had quite a bit of bait left and enough wind for the kite so we anchored the boat and began to chum with live pilchards. After about 10 minutes of throwing the chum in the water, the ocean came alive. There were fish jumping all around the boat. A few moments later all four rods were bent over simultaneously . It was absolute pandemonium but we managed to land all four of the fish. To my surprise there were four black fin tuna in the boat all from 15-25lbs which is a rare occurance this time of year.
On our way back home we decided to run into the deep water and look for mahis. Two hours later we noticed a group of small terns picking in the water. Dmitri and Michael threw out a couple livies and instantly hooked two dolphin at once. I looked behind the boat and saw a sea of green. The boys went to work and landed 12 dolphin. Our fish box was full so we decided to call it quits. It’s always nice when a plan comes to work.

  My last trip before I headed across the Atlantic was a swordfish charter. It was the day of the full moon which made me a bit skeptical for day time swording. Like I always say, you can’t catch them on the couch. We left Govt. Cut early in the morning and headed 120 degrees. On the way out we noticed a chair floating in the water. Mark and I threw out two pilchards and found a big school of dolphin under the floater. A half hour later we had our limit of 3-5 lb schoolies and proceeded on our course. Once we approached the swordfish grounds we stopped, checked the drift , and dropped the first bait down. No bites. We made two more drops. No bites. The final drop we decided to change our bait and dropped a whole Spanish mackerel. Five minutes later we had our first bite. The fish fought a little bit on the bottom then came right up. After 30 minutes of battle we landed a nice 120 lb swordfish to end the day!

  From now- November is a great time to target swordfish in Miami. If you have not caught one ,late summer and fall are prime months. On the way out to the swordfish grounds you always have a chance to catch dolphin, wahoo, and tuna.

Bahamas trips are a good fun due to the flat calm seas we have in the summer months. There we catch big yellowtail snapper, grouper, Spanish mackerel, sharks, tuna, and dolphin just to name a few. If you like action and would prefer not to travel we can fish the reefs for bonita, kingfish, sailfish,and wahoo.

Theres always something to catch in South Florida so pick up your phone and lets make it happen.

 

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