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