What a great month June has been. June 5th we had Brian and his guest out fishing and caught so many kings and bonito that I lost count. We also caught a sailfish, a mutton snapper and a blackfin tuna.
On the 6th we fished the Miami Dolphins Tournament with Paul and AJ Castronovo and his fishing gang of Kurt, Kevin and Sammy. We had solid action resulting in 16 kings, 20 bonito, 5 dolphin and 3 blackfin tuna. We missed 2nd place by a pound. Being vice chairman, Paul had to decline our place among the prize takers.
Sunday we fished with the Mobile Meds guys and caught 2 tuna, 4 kings, 8 mahi, an amberjack, 8 bonito, a barracuda, 3 mutton snappers and a red grouper.
Monday night we fished for tarpon with Tim Choates and caught tarpon of 80 and 150 pounds.
Our next trip was the beginning of a week of fishing with Rick Azipuru, his sons Matt and Daniel and friend John Mahoney. Our first day got off to a slow start due to flight delays. Daniel saved the day with a 30 pound permit at Government Cut. The next day we fished the Dusky Owners Tournament and caught 1 dolphin before running to Bimini for the next 4 days.
Daniel and his permit
The action in Bimini was epic. We caught big yellowtail snappers, amberjacks, sharks, cero mackerel and horse eye jacks on the reef and 8 blackfin tuna offshore. And that was day one. Day two we got a couple beautiful jumps out of a 400 pound blue marlin, 25 big yellowtail snappers, a cero mackerel and 25 dolphin on jigs and fly casting. On the way home we saw a huge whale with a calf. Day three was hectic. We caught a load of barracudas, a few yellow jacks, cero mackerel, a shark, a couple small grouper, tons of big yellowtails, 4 huge horse eye jacks, a 25 pound black grouper and 10 giant blue runners. On Thursday we had to head home, but first we hit a couple of wrecks off Bimini. We caught some nice yellowtail snappers and a couple big amberjacks. On the way home we caught a 25 pound bull dolphin and 20 school dolphin.
Friday night we fished with Dave, Dave and Paula. They caught 3 tarpon from 80 to 100 pounds.
Saturday, June 20th, we fished with Laura, Ed and Mark. They had a fun day scoring with 3 kings, 10 bonito, a sailfish, a tuna and 2 barracuda.
Just how great is south Florida fishing? On Sunday afternoon, June 21st, Father's Day 2009 Don and Sandy Blake took their son-in-law Don Goodwin fishing for swordfish. The Blakes drove up from Homestead and Don Goodwin down from Palm Beach to depart from Miami Beach Marina at 2 PM.
Bouncer's Dusky 33 set sail at 2 and stopped in two places to catch 50 herring for live bait. With live bait in the well the crew headed out to the swordfish grounds. The first bait, a bonito strip was dropped overboard and headed for the bottom, 1600 feet below at 3:50 PM.
At 4:25 the rod tip rose as the weight of 16 pounds of paver bricks was lifted by a swordfish. Don Goodwin, an very accomplished marlin angler was hooked up to the first swordfish of his life. At 5:15 mates Steve Huddleston and Billy Springer pulled Don's 110 pound swordfish in the boat.
The day was made. But then the trip was till 10 PM and the Blakes love catching fish too. They felt that fighting swordfish up from 1600 feet was too much for them. Being the sportsmen they are, they would never catch swordfish by pushing the button on an electric reel. So we went off in search of other action. We could find no dolphin but on Saturday there were kings, tuna and sails along the edge. So with the setting sun we headed west back to 120 feet of water.
Sandy and her big king
From 7 to 8:30 PM both Dons and Sandy caught kingfish of 12, 18, 25, 25 and 43 pounds. The first 4 were estimated weights as they were released. Sandy's 43 pound beauty was on the scale. Sandy added a very acrobatic sailfish to the score.
Don ask if a snook catch was possible as darkness fell. From 9 to 9:45 5 snook were hooked on live herring fished along Government Cut. the two that failed to reach the rocks and cut the leader were estimated at 12 and 25 pounds.
A well fished out group of anglers, two very skilled mates and myself made it back to the dock with time to spare on a 8 hour fishing trip. A swordfish, 5 big kings, a sailfish and 2 big snook are a good example of how good south Florida fishing is.
Don (left) with his snook
The summer business pace set in after that trip. We are now fishing a couple days a week. W fished on the 24th with Pat. He is a 72 year young gentleman who recently move here from South America. He had tried for tarpon for years with no luck. By the end of our 4 hour evening trip he had caught tarpon of 40 and 90 pounds.
On Friday night we fished with Tony and his son Sam. Sam is 12 years old and fights fish like a expert. his straight back and working the rod with his legs allowed him to beat 3 tarpon and bring them boatside to release. These silver monsters were 100 to 150 pounds.
Don, the crew and his swordfish
After placing 1st last June and second last December in the local swordfish tournaments, I guess we were due for a bad trip. We fished the Summer Swordfish Slam on Saturday night and had no bites. It was a beautiful night with good people. The fleet had 28 boats catching 14 swordfish. We will be back for the December event.
Dusky Sport Center is having a seminar on July 16th at 6:30 PM where I will discuss how you can catch more fish. Call 954-922-8890 for details.
I will be at Galluppis, 954-785-0226, 1103 N. Federal Hwy. on July 20th at 7 PM to discuss what we are catching and how we are doing it this summer.
Summer time means loads of snook, swordfish, dolphin and snapper. To go catch a bunch e-mail me at captbouncer@bellsouth.net or call 305-573-8224.