The Cheap Yellowtail Rods

Today was the first time I got to play with the cheap Yellowtail rods.  We managed to find a decent current and came close to limiting out on 'tails.  In fact we had very few throw backs with a good number of 15 inch fish.  Not stellar by any means but fairly respectable.

The cheap rods did their jobs with no hitches which isn't bad for dirt cheap gear.  The clients were a bit impressed with them and noticed that they didn't need any fancy flourocarbon leader since the cheap reels are spooled with fresh Berkley clear 15 pound test line.  No fuss, no muss, just catch fish.

The boat in the background by the way was part of the two boat guide package today.  That boat seemed to focus more on the grunts and porgies which they like but they did get a few 'tails and one of the 'tails got one of their not so cheap rods.  They sat the rod on the deck for just a moment longer than it should have.

This trip I also was able to catch a net full of Ballyhoo for a change.  It has been a while since I got a cast net wet so that is a good thing.  We only converted one of the Ballyhoo into a Cero Mackerel though.  I am not sure why the Ceros are so finicky this year, but they are.

Marathon in the Florida Keys should be your next fishing vacation destination. Join us for charter fishing, fishing guide trips or our fishing 101 so you can fish on your own with better success.


 Tight lines,

 Capt. Dallas

Yellowtail Snapper

Yep, that is a Yellowtail Snapper.  We had a family fun day, some fishing, some snorkeling on the Lady Catherine yesterday.  Slow bite but some nice sized Triggerfish and Yellowtails. The crew didn't have much fishing experience so we didn't slay the fish, but they did have fun and learned how to maybe slay them next time out.

The current is very unpredictable, but if you happen to catch a decent current, the fish are biting.  However, the bite may not last very long so take advantage of it while it lasts.

Marathon in the Florida Keys should be your next fishing vacation destination. Join us for charter fishing, fishing guide trips or our fishing 101 so you can fish on your own with better success.

 Tight lines,

 Capt. Dallas

Offshore July 19th

Like I have been mentioning there are some decent dolphin offshore but you do have to spend some time hunting for them.  This bull is about 20 pounds and a wedding present with the bride to be kicking butt.

We found this one about 17 miles from the beach on about the only trollable weed line we saw.  There is weed everywhere and thanks to the 10 knot winds out of the south in the morning it was a pretty confused mess of scattered weeds with a few huge patches.  Inside of 16 miles there were Blue Runners everywhere keeping the birds busy so we found this one without their help.

We ended up with a baker's dozen and in the photo are a couple of the big blue runners that were making pests of themselves.  We didn't see a tuna all day.

Since the Blue Runners volunteered, the schoolies were caught mainly on Blue Runner chunks.;

Marathon in the Florida Keys should be your next fishing vacation destination. Join us for charter fishing, fishing guide trips or our fishing 101 so you can fish on your own with better success.

 Tight lines,

 Capt. Dallas

How is July Going?

I just finished four days with my regular Hobbs party.  We caught fish but never had a hot bite.  Patches, Rockpiles, Reef and Wreck fishing but never had what I would call a real bite lasting more than maybe 20 minutes.  We mainly put mangroves and grunts in the box.  One of the party was George "Grunt" Grant and he happens to like grunts.  The Mangroves ranged from just keepers to a couple of pounds.  We kept maybe six grouper, mainly Rock Hind with one Black Grouper that made the cut, several Rainbow Runners, a few Porgies, Trigger, Hogfish and a large Barracuda along with a good number of Mangrove and Yellowtail Snapper.

The Patches and Rock Piles were really disappointing.  Typically we would have had plenty of Porgies, Lane Snapper and Hogfish on the patches.  For whatever reason that bite was way off though there were plenty of undersized Hogfish.

Since we had a west wind most of the time I guess I could blame it on that, but with the exception of one day the winds were light and variable.  In any case it was slow by our standards, they only had one cooler full of fish and not three or four this trip.

What was really missing was the Cero Mackerel bite.  We saw quite a few Cero singles but they never schooled up in the chum.  Ceros have been a regular on other trips with Hobbs along with a stray King Mackerel once and a while.  Had the ballyhoo been thicker that would have kicked things up a notch.  I did see ballyhoo a few times but they never were thick or got close enough to put a net over them.  We did see plenty of speedos, scads, but didn't catch may thanks to my getting barbed up with a Sabiki rig.  There was also not much of a jack bite which tends to provide a lot of action though most aren't considered quality table fare.  So if you are coming down in the next week or so expect to catch fish, but you will likely not get worn out catching them.  

The night bite is a different story from what I hear.  There are plenty of Mangroves on the reef and they tend to get more stupid at night.  Dolphin are still waay offshore with several of the guys I talked to not putting lines in the water until they are 20 miles off the beach.  Some are doing pretty good and a few are only getting a handful of gaffers for their effort.

On the stellar side is the weather and the visibility.  While calm and clear water make the fishing tougher it makes the diving great.  Next month you will have the option of Lobstering if the fishing bite is slow.

 Marathon in the Florida Keys should be your next fishing vacation destination. Join us for charter fishing, fishing guide trips or our fishing 101 so you can fish on your own with better success.

 Tight lines,

 Capt. Dallas

Closing out June

I have had a number of trips and managed to take almost no photos.  Most of the trips have been offshore and while the bite isn't fantastic we are catching fish.  Tuna have been harder than I remember.  Yesterday isn't a good example, the hump on Sunday before July 4th was a parking lot and we only managed one BlackFin.  Generally, we would hit a good number of Skippies and BlackFin past the ups and downs but this year not so much.  We should have stayed with the schoolie dolphin is 800 foot of water and waited for a big one but I was under a tight schedule needing to be back at the dock by 1:00.

800 to 1200 foot seems to be the right range for now since the stream has been staying offshore.  There are more fishing moving closer to the reef but they are still mainly peanuts.  Still lots of Sargasso Weed everywhere and it is still scattered making trolling a pain.  Magic floaters and big patches are good bets for getting fish in the box.  Seeing lots of small triple tail as well.

I was hoping to get a snapper trip or two in but everyone has wanted to go offshore. Maybe this week.  

Marathon in the Florida Keys should be your next fishing vacation destination. Join us for charter fishing, fishing guide trips or our fishing 101 so you can fish on your own with better success.


 Tight lines,

 Capt. Dallas

June is a little off.

People always ask what is the best month to come down to the Keys fishing.  That depends on the weather and the fish.  May is typically the best month for everything, decent weather and good fishing, but weather is weather and fish are fish, so you never really know until you get here.  June is probably the second best month if you are looking for big dolphin in a smaller boat.

This past week though both the fishing and the weather was on the weak side.  We did get an offshore trip with good conditions, 10 to 15 knot winds with most of the day closer to 10 knots and we found plenty of decent size dolphin.  We managed to pull the hooks on the biggest so the day didn't look that great at the dock, but the crew had a good time and we had the banana excuse for the missed fish.  Since I was on the flybridge I got a good view of all the fish we missed.  Nothing humongous, but lots of fish in the high teens to low twenties meandering down weed trickles while the hoards of peanuts jumped the baits.  When that happens you have to guess right on your bait.  The larger fish hit whole or half Ballyhoo pitch baits and passed on the chunks. Pinfish would have most likely been the ticket, but since the crew was having fun with the small fish, some keepers most not, and the weeds were not well formed, we never got a weed free pinfish in front of a large enough fish to find out.

The weeds were not well formed thanks to a Southeast wind that spread the slicks out.  It made trolling so tough that wandering from one large weed patch to the next was more productive than trolling.  Sometimes the bigger fish would show sometimes not. We found most of the fish in the 650 to 700 foot range but I heard of people picking up a good fish here and there all over the place.  No one I know of hammered big fish this week.

The next two days though the Southeast wind picked up to 20 plus knots and fishing pretty much sucked.  Most of the action is on the ocean side and most of my customers were stuck with the bridge and Bayside.  For whatever reason, the red gumbo grass is thicker than normal so fishing requires much more work than it should near the bridge.  If the boats were a bit bigger or the customers a bit more seaworthy, the rockpiles would have been the place to be since there are still nice fat porgies out there along with Grouper and Mutton snapper if you find the right pile.  Mangroves are moving to the reef to spawn, so the Bayside and bridge were loaded with smaller fish, keepers not so much though.   With lots of small fish, lots more gumbo and winds just high enough to make anchoring a PITA, yesterday was painful.

According to Windfinder, winds should get a bit more East and drop a bit bringing things back to normal, but weather men have been known to lie.  Tarpon fishing is still good at Bahia Honda if you want to play bumper boats, but that is about the most consistent report I have.  Marathon in the Florida Keys should be your next fishing vacation destination. Join us for charter fishing, fishing guide trips or our fishing 101 so you can fish on your own with better success.

 Tight lines,

 Capt. Dallas