The last week has offered up some great fishing both here and in Bimini. We ran over to Bimini on Sunday and hooked up with a super bunch of guys from Wisconsin. We had 3 boats and 5 anglers for 3 days of fly fishing.
What a hoot! The first day we worked up on the banks, east of Bimini. We caught numerous blue runners up to 8 pounds, loads of yellowtail snappers, a couple sharks and several barracudas. All of these fly casting. Pat Helland made the big score of the day with a 37 pound amberjack on 12 pound tippet fly.
Ryan worked the fish heavily with assorted plugs on spin tackle. He feed Rapalas and many other plugs to big jack crevalle, horse eye jacks, cudas, sharks, blue runners and yellowtails.
Day two started with 20 knot winds and threats of rain. We ran south for 20 miles and set up along the edge of the reef. As soon as the chum hit the water a cloud of big yellowtails rose from the reef. It was non-stop action with big yellowtails and cero mackerel fighting over any fly Pat offered the fish. For over 4 hours it was steady action.
When things finally shut down we ran up on the bank and switched to catching barracuda on the fly. We did have a brief hookup with an amberjack and caught a couple more yellowtails.
Day three dawned with a little less wind and rain. We ran up on the bank and found the fish as hungry as the other days. We caught numerous yellowtails, blue runners, barracudas and mackerel. Emmitt caught a beautiful 37 pound amberjack on 20 pound tippet fly. As the sun settled to the west we finally had to call our trip to an end. No one could ever compute how many fish we caught that final day. We know we had a 4 pound yellowtail on a popper fly. We caught a 7 pound cero on a streamer fly. The biggest blue runner was 8 pounds, and that's on the scale. We wore out dozens of flies and 3 or 4 arms, but it was fly fishing heaven.
We did have to bow down to Tom, Matty and Aaron as Matty guided Tom to a 56 pound amberjack on fly and Aaron managed to get it in the boat and on the scale. Ryan fished with Steve the last day and used heavy tackle to capture a couple big sharks for the biggest fish prize.
Those 5 anglers will have a lot of stories to tell and flies to tie over the next few months.
We fished here in Miami the last couple days. On Friday we found loads of dolphin about 5 miles offshore. We kept 30 dolphin for the guys to take back home for some great dinners and tagged 15 dolphin for future knowledge of their growth and travels. Top fish was over 20 pounds and caught in 150 feet of water right off the inlet.
That evening the guys caught 2 out of 4 tarpon. The best was over 125 pounds.
Saturday we helped Brandon celebrate his 11th birthday. He caught loads of dolphin up to 20 pounds about 6 miles offshore, plus a barracuda and a dolphin closer to the reef.
Trent , 12, caught two blackfin tuna and a barracuda Saturday night. His fishing partners caught another two tuna and two barracuda to fill the evening with action.
Tuna and tarpon should keep anglers busy through June. Then we will be busy catching snook and swordfish the rest of the summer. Send me an e-mail if you want to join the fun. captbouncer@bellsouth.net
