June 1
Today we had a shared charter with Chad from Buffalo New York and Wayne and his son Jack, Emma and Hanna all from Alabama.
We started out trolling the reef and everyone got to catch some king fish. Than we pulled in all the trolling gear and set out our kites with live baits suspended from them and we also set out a couple of shark baits. One down about 150 feet with a dead king fish and last but not least was a dead king fish set down on the bottom 350 down.
It took a bit of waiting but all at once our deep rod bent over and line was peeling off the reel as if it would never stop. Chad had let everyone know that he was very interested in having a big game fish mounted so we all decided to give him first shot at whatever it was that was taking all this line off the reel. Once we got Chad in the chair there really was not much he could do the fish was just taking line at will. But after a few min the fish did finally settle down and Chad did start to slowly but surely gain a bit of line back. It was a big back and forth tug a war for a long time but at last Chad finally got this monster hammer head shark to the boat.
Once at the boat we knew we had to get a measurement of Chad's big catch in order to have the taxidermy make a replica trophy of his fish. So J. J opened the tuna door in the back of the boat and somehow got this big hammer head shark to slide in for a quick measurement and than somehow slid him right back out the door to fight another day. Nice job J.J and Chad.
What a way to start out the new month. June is here and so are the kingfish, Sharks and dolphin fish so give us a call and let's get you Hooked Up.
Captain Taco (954) 764-4344
June 4
Today we had our old customer/friend Mats from Oslo Norway fishing with us and he brought along his brother in law Karl and his good friend Anders.
While I knew that Mats had caught a lot of fish in the past and I also knew that he was only interested in going after Big Game I knew that Karl and Anders were happy just catching any fish.
So I decided to start out trolling on the reef. And today the kings were biting well. Everyone got to catch some fish before going after the big one.
Once we had all caught enough king fish and bonitos we brought in all of the trolling gear and out went our kites with live baits suspended from them followed by one dead king fish down about 150 feet and one last shark bait down on the bottom.
Now the trap was set and all we needed was for some kind of a big sea monster to swim up and eat one of our baits.
We waited for about 2 min and all of a sudden I seen our balloon with a king fish on the other end about 150 feet down disappear and we were Hooked Up. Anders had heard about some of the big fish that Mats had caught and he had also seen some of his fish hanging on his wall at home and he wanted a shot at catching a big trophy game fish to hang on his wall. Having said that Anders jumped in the chair and the fight was on.
It was a big back and forth tug a war for a good 25 min till Anders finally got this MONSTER Sand Bar shark to the boat. At first we were not even sure about what kind of shark this was. I have caught a lot of sand bar sharks in the past but they all seem to be about the same size. They are all cut out of the same mold between 55 to 70 inches but not this one. This fish was so big that we knew that we were going to have to slide him into the tuna door to get a good measurement of him and we also wanted to see if we could get the hooks out of him in order for him to have a good chance of making it after we released him.
As it turned out all three hooks were way down in his stomach and no one was willing to stick their hands in there to get them out. This SEA MONSTER turned out to be 107 inches long and I would guess 225 pounds. We cut the leader as close to his mouth as we could and slide him right back out the door.
Our intent is not to kill these fish so they can live to fight another day and the taxidermy does NOT need the fish in order to have a replica mount made of the fish. But all the same I'm not to sure how well this one made out but what I do know is that he has a better chance than he does lying dead in the boat.
Holly Cow what a catch way to go Anders.
Ok now that everyone had caught fish we were looking good and still had some time left so since we still had most of our baits still out there we decided to just stay right where we were and see if we could catch Karl a big fish.
This time it took a bit of waiting but within 30 min once again our balloon went under and we were Hooked Up again.
This time Karl jumped in the chair and he had his hands full. He had a good 20 min of back and forth but at last he got his catch up to the side of the boat. This one turned out to be a golden hammer head shark. We were not going to get a measurement of this one so we managed to get 2 out of the 3 hooks out of him and he swam away in great shape.
At this point we still had our kites out with the live goggles suspended from them and we figured if it ante broke don't fix it so while we did not put out any more big shark baits we did still have our live baits out there and we figured maybe a sail fish or a dolphin fish might just swim up and eat one of our live baits.
We were all talking and high fiving and not really paying that much attention to the baits when all of a sudden I seen another small golden hammer head shark after one of our live baits. We were going to pull the bait out of the water when our mate Captain Tommy Copper yelled out that he had put wire leaders on all the kite baits.
Seconds after that this shark ate the bait and now Mats was standing up fighting his shark. He was really putting it to this shark when all of a sudden the line went slack. (RATS) As it turned out the shark had broken our #6 wire and got away. BUT WAIT A MIN just as Mats reeled in his slack line I seen a big splash by our left long kite bait and line was just screaming off the reel. Mads graded the rod and once again he was Hooked Up. This time it turned out to be a big black fin tuna.
Now that's a great day of fishing followed up by some great sushi after.
Mats, Karl and Anders my good friends from Norway thanks soooo much for a great day of fishing and Mats good luck on your sword fish trip with us this Wed!! (To be continued)
June is finally here and fishing has been great so give us a call and let's get you Hooked Up
Captain Taco (954) 764-4344 or toll free (877) SEA-4344
June 6
Today was a family outing with Larry, Shelby, Robert, Phil and Laurie all from Claycomo Mo And Monica from West By God Virginia.
We started out looking for some big game fish so we set out our kites with some live baits suspended from them and we also set out two big shark baits one down about 150 feet down and last bait on the bottom 350 feet down.
Today the fish did not come quite so easy for us we waited and waited and yes waited for a bite. But at last something had taken our long kite bait and line was peeling off the reel. (WE WERE HOOKED UP)
Just in time too we were just about to switch up and try something else.
The girls were up first and there was no way any one of them was going to do it by them self's so they all helped out and finally got this big hammer head shark to the boat. We were going to bring the shark in and get a quick measurement of him to have a replica trophy made of him but the shark had a mind of his own and before I could get down stairs to give Captain Greg a hand the fish was in the boat and going nuts. Once I got down stairs all I could see was big hooks swing everywhere and Greg trying to get out of the way.
Once the fish settled down I seen some blood coming from Greg's hand and I knew that this was going to be ugly. We are not sure what got him? One of the hooks or maybe just the tail of the fish but whatever it was he had a good gash in one of his hands.
We finally got our measurement and a couple of quick pictures and back out of the boat he went.
(holly cow) That was a tough one. Now that we had caught a big game fish we decided to just try to catch everyone some fish. So we went trolling the reef. It turned out to be the right choice we ended up catching a box full of king fish a big jack on the troll and one black fin tuna.
Now it was time to reel everything in and head back for the dock. So everyone was lending a hand reeling all the rods in when one of the girls Monica I think said that her line was not coming in. Captain Greg had thought that we got hung up into the bottom but I assured him that we were in too deep of water and this was not bottom. As it turned out she had hooked into a giant sea turtle. (That's a first for me)
We managed to get all the line back so as not to harm the turtle and watched him swam away in fine shape.
Guy's thanks again for a trip I'll never forget.
Captain Taco (954) 764-4344
June 9
I don't know where to start today's fishing report? So I will start by listing all the people on board today. As luck would have it we had a little schedule mix up today and when I showed up to work today I also seen Captain J.J. and Captain Greg standing there ready to go fishing. Our customer / friend today was Mats from Norway and this was going to be his last chance to go fishing in Sunny South Florida before heading back home to Norway. Mats has fishing all over the world and has also been fishing in South Florida since he was 12 years old with me and Captain Greg so we all wanted to go for Big or Broke.
We all decided to go way off shore in search of the big swordfish and we also figured that it would not be a bad idea to have two guys down in the cockpit just in case we did get a hold of a big one. In the past month I had caught a sword fish with each of them. One with Greg that weighed about 250 pounds and one with J.J. that we estimated to weigh about 400 pound. Both of these fish gave us a hell of a hard time at the boat.
Ok so the stage was set and off we went trolling at 9 knots with a few lures out hoping to catch some dolphin fish on our way out. We did find a weed line with a couple of boats catching smaller dolphin fish but this was not what we were looking for so we left them and kept going further and further off shore. At last here we were now it was just a matter of where we were going to drop our bait down to the bottom. We all talked about it a bit and we knew where J.J. had caught our 400 pounder just a few weeks ago and decided that would be the spot.
So in came all the lures out went our squid. It took about 7 min to finally get to the bottom but with in 2 min of getting to the bottom the rod twitched once then again and then one more time and we knew that we had a bite and since the rod never moved again we figured that a sword fish had hit it with his bill and had gotten the squid off the hook. So we started reeling our line back up to the surface and sure enough that was just what had happen. All we had left on the hook was a little piece of the squid.
Ok so we have not caught him yet but at least we found them. Buy the time the beat up bait made it back up to the boat Captain J.J. had another ready to go and right back down it went. This time Captain Greg was dropping the bait. As Greg got close to the bottom he asked if we had ever heard of anyone getting the bite on the way down. No sooner than the words came out of his mouth he got a hit and stopped dropping. Now remember on these deep drops we use an electric reel so Greg hit the button on the reel and started to reel it up just a bit to see if what ever hit the bait would come back and take another shot at it. As he was slowly reeling the bait up we noticed the rod kept twitching for a lack of a better word. So he just kept coming up with it and sure enough there was something on the other end. The closer he got to the surface the more the rod was twitching. Ok now we knew there was something on the other end for sure but it never did pull out not even an inch of line so we figured whatever it was it was small. All the same J.J. got the gaffs out we were loaded for bear.
Here where things started getting ugly. Before we even got our lead up and out of the water we seen our hook all wrapped up in the main line. Than all hell broke loose up popped this monster sword fish and he was not even hooked he was all wrapped up in the line. All I heard was Captain Greg yell out come back hard on this one. Bear in mind these words being yelled out were being yelled out by someone who I've never heard get excited at the site of any fish at the boat. J.J. had the leader and was pulling on it with all he had and remember the hook was at this point behind J.J. so if he were to let go of the leader he could have been hooked and dragged overboard. I never knew my boat could go so fast in reverse but I was going to stay right on top of this one. Captain Greg was hanging over the side of the boat hopping to just get one shot at this fish with the gaff. As I was watching all of this unfold in front of me I could not help but think O @$%*&!* someone going to get hurt on this one and I sure hope it's the fish.
The fish took one look at Greg the boat and the gaff and decided to get the heck out of here and down he went. Captain J.J. had no choice but to hang on for dear life and the line just sled off the fish. And just like that he was gone. (RATS) How big was this fish you ask?? Well let's just say BIG. It is fish like this that keeps us coming back. Greg figured it to be somewhere around 600 pounds. The kicker in this story was that I had my camera on and sitting right next to me the whole time and never got a free second to get a shot of the fish.
The bad news is that he got away the good news is that he got away. Had Greg got a gaff into this fish that had not even began to fight I have no idea what would have happen. And the other good news about this fish is that he is still out there waiting for you to charter the Hooked Up and try your luck at catching him.
Summer is here and the ocean is like a lake so come on down to South Florida and let's catch the one that got away. (LOL)
Captain Taco (954) 764-4344 or toll free (877) SEA-4344
June 11
This morning we started out with a father and son fishing team Greg and Trapper from Oklahoma. We started out trolling the reef just looking to put some fish in the box to break the ice. And as it turned out we made the right decision and ended up catching a box full of king fish a few bonitos and one big black fin tuna that we were going to eat the next day on their second fishing trip with us. Ok now that we had some fish in the box time to go for the BIG one. We had little to no current and no wind to fly our kites so we just set out three big dead bait. One on the surface one down about 150 and the last one down on the bottom 350 down.
The trap was set now all we needed was for something big to come along and eat one of our baits. As I said before we had no current and we had a full moon so things did not look so good for getting the sent out to increase our chances for a bite.
We waited and waited and waited then just as we were about to wrap it up and go back to trolling our deep rod bent over and line was peeling off the reel. We were Hooked Up and Trapper jumped in the chair and it was game on.
At this point we were so far away from our inlet and this fish showed no signs of letting up I knew that we were going to be running late for our afternoon trip. I called our afternoon charter on the phone and let them know what was going on. They all let me know to take as long as needed and to give them a call when we were on our way in. Ok so now the pressure was off me and we could concentrate on catching whatever the heck this was on the other end.
Trapper had finally worn the fish down a bit and was now getting some line back on the reel when all of a sudden the line went slack. (RATS) At first we had no idea what went wrong but once we reeled the bait in we seen our bait was just fine. Not a mark on it. As it turned out our leader was a mess and I guess the fish had got all caught up in the leader. I could not believe this. This was just what had happen to us a couple of days earlier on a sword fish.
We were out of time a running a bit late so we headed back for the dock. But the good news was that they both were going to spending the whole day fishing with us tomorrow.
Once we got back to the dock we had Ann (the phone#) and her best friend Cheryl, Devin, Keifer who had just graduated school and last but not least Franky all from Ravendenar Arkansas.
They were looking for some fish to take back home with them. We started out trolling the reef and caught a box full of king fish and bonitos. What we were doing was working so we figured if it ante broke don't fix it. So we just kept on trolling. And man were we glad we did. We ran into a school of dolphin fish and started catching them with light tackle spinning rods. We had caught everyone in the school except one and of course it was the biggest one in the school. We had him on for a second but he managed to shake the hook lose. But Captain J.J. was set on catching that last one and after a bit of chumming the waters he came back for more. Soon enough he just could not help it and he ate. This time Franky jumped on the rod. It was a back and forth tug a war for about 5 min before J.J. was finally able to sink the gaff into him.
Way to go guys!!! The box was full and everyone had a ball. After losing a few big fish in the last couple of days we needed a boast me up like this trip.
And in closing Ann when giving out your phone # remember don't give half of one # and the other half another # (LOL)
Summer is here and so are the calm waters and the king fish and dolphin fish are starting to show up good so give us a call and let's get you Hooked Up.
Captain Taco (954) 7764-4344 or toll free at (877) SEA-4344
