Category: fishing

July is here in all it’s glory. I sure am glad that the maintenance cycle is over (for now), and we can concentrate on chasing the fish around! You have no idea how badly I missed getting on the water. I am happy to report that … other than the captain’s windshield wiper on the Woody Too, and the GPS is acting funny on the Lil Woody (grrr), that all systems are go, and I am 100 percent fishable!

So let’s fish! Good quality time with my dear wife. 4^th of July weekend hit and Saturday and Sunday were Blue Bird perfect days, but Monday we were on Tropical Storm Warnings! 😦 Which translates to Offshore Saturday, Reef Sunday, Storm Monday. As Glen said, at least you have a plan for each day!

Off we went, boat full of gas, we had caught fresh ballyhoo, so out to the edge of the earth our destination. The water was flat – and was full of birds, weed lines, bottlenose dolphin everywhere and …. NO FISH! Got some good photos and videos – but honestly we started worrying about dinner!

We fished way outside the wall 1500 – 2800 feet.  Since the action was slow, I pulled out my old Sam Scott rod and my Waldo inheritance 9/0 reel and put a big planer down rigged with a pink and white Hawaiian eye tipped with a whole ballyhoo.  The rig was the ticket,  we did not catch anything on it, but it got hit a few time, and brought the school of dolphin up to the surface, and we got a nice Bull to save the day!

Speaking of dinner, robin made a wonderful Mahi and Fruit dish that will blow your mind!

Sunday –  Reef day

Pinfish traps were disappointing – we got 4 live baits when Looe and I checked the night before.  So I made a deal with Robin that I would go catch bait at the crack of dawn, and then we would go out and hit the reef.  Off Looe and I went at sunrise, and sabiki’s in hand we made light work of baitfishing, and got about 4 dozen pinfish and grunts … perfect snapper candy.  We also got a half dozen big pins and grunts for grouper.

I went home loaded up the Woody Too and Robin and I headed out. We went to the edge of the reef, found good shows of fish on the sonar at 75 feet, dropped anchor and chum. No current! None – seriously none!. We caught a couple small yellowtail but nothing! Anchor up, next spot and same result. Crap!

We moved on down the reef to a spot we call the Mushroom. Same MO – cruise the structure, find the best fish show, drop anchor and hook up. Chum down, baits in … hit … we started catching some small fish, at least we found something. Then boom – Robin’s rod bends in half, Black grouper! Right after that, same tune on my rod – limit done.

We limited out at 12:00 – we called it our day and headed home. Boat and fish cleaned and in the pool by 2:00. Not too shabby!

Check out these monstera – they are taking over! Love the feature, kinda like a plant cave!

Robin turned that grouper into a Pecan Crusted masterpiece that blew us away!

Next on deck Tropical Storm Elsa.  Weather channel talked of doom and destruction.  Once again we were in the cone, and this time we could not shake it.  So Monday became hurricane prep day, and we did it in style, with ribs on the smoker.  They were awesome!

Elsa came and went. Weather channel reporters packed up and left. Ended up being a small blow lots of rain, but an overall good drill. Always happy when the water stays IN the canal and not under the house!

Through the week, I put the challenge out that we needed to do something different and celebrate all this beautiful fish. Robin answered with a Spanish Fish Chowder/Stew. Shrimp and huge hunks of grouper with chorizo in a tomato based broth – wow!

This past weekend the weather was a bit stormy so we were not sure if we could get out or not. We really wanted to do the night bite for Mangrove Snapper, but it was way too unstable to try going out in the dark – especially with the new moon. We finally made the call to hit the reef Sunday during the day, and Looe and I went and got bait lined up.

I planned the day to be a 1 stop day – meaning I was only going to throw the anchor once, and see what we come up with. We went to a rockpile off the Maryland Shoal, and anchored right on top of the fish show in 28 feet of water. Chum in … NO CURRENT! …. This is starting to get frustrating! We did attract small yellowtail – that Robin messed with all day. But also hit a bunch of Strawberry Grouper, and we put a pretty big one in the cooler. Robin got some fairly nice yellowtail, and the largest joined the grouper in the cooler.

Part of the fun .. I guess .. we were watching storms to the east and west of us, but they pretty much left us alone.  Out of the blue, a cell build up and got us dead center with a good fresh water rinsing.  No lightening, but a bit of wind and a lot of rain!

I got picked up by something big freelining a pinfish, and it broke off after running around the boat a couple times. Shark? Sure seemed like one, but it did not cut the line … I pushed it too hard and the line broke. A half hour later I got picked up again – same M.O. – ran around the boat, took me under the engine, but this time I eased up on it and played it out. Boom – nice Mutton Snapper under the boat!

We called that a day and came on back. Robin treated again … yellowtail sushimi and Carribean Mutton Snapper curry! Delicious!!!!

We may get one more trip next weekend to round out the month.  If so I will post an update.  If not, I will get back on the blog after our RV trip to Kentucky and the Mid-West.

Later – Bo

Moment of truth after 6 months … do you believe it … 6 months of repair and maintenance activities.  Back in the water she goes and sea trials underway.

Robin and I started with an offshore run looking for mahi and tuna. It was a blue-bird day, seas were flat and full of boats. So we worked on offshore pretty deep to find space that open and fish that were not pressured. Robin, my ace fish finder, made it happen, and we picked up a dozen or so schoolies and teenagers. Depths were out to 2500 feet. There were a lot of fish out there, and nicely formed weedlines. The boat ran great, but I did have several small bugs to work through. All good, and fresh fish for dinner!

Next up vacation! It is June, and that brings Glen and Tom. They drove down to the keys and arrived on Saturday 6/13. Great to have them back in town. The basic plan for the week – fish our butts off!

Sunday 6/13 – back offshore. Similar plan to Robin’s and my trip the previous weekend. We trolledi ballyhoo and tuna baits offshore. Unfortunately we were bracketed in with thunderstorms and played the dodge the storm thing all day. We did get into fish, and picked up a nice group of schoolie dolphin. Nothing big but all tasty!

Monday 6/14-15 Bucket list trip for me. It looked like the weather was going to give us a couple good days, so we made the call to head way west to the tortugas. We invited our friend and neighbor Paul to join us, and loaded the boat with bait, chum, ice, food, drinks and 4 stinky guys and off we went. The plan was to spend Monday working our way toward the Tortugas and fish the reef on our way west. Overnight on the reef, and then work offshore and deep drop on Tuesday working our way back home.

The weather we saw was not what was forecasted. We had a southwest wind, 15 knots that we had to run directly into. I hugged the shoreline out past Key West, and then we turned pretty much directly into the seas off of Man Key. Once we got out on the reef we anchored on at least 10 different rockpiles and humps, and really got on no action at all. Disappointed we anchored up for the night near Rebecca Shoal, ate dinner and settled in for the night.

We had a visitor – a pelican decided he/she wanted to spend the night on the bow of the boat, and paul had to pretty much throw it off so he could find a sleeping spot. I wish I would have taken a picture of it … and the pelican extraction … those birds are huge! Also I learned that they are some slimy dirty birds. It left black grease all over everything, and when we got back home, Glen using dawn and a lot of elbow grease spent 2 or 3 runs scrubbing to get it off.

Next day after breakfast we headed offshore and tried deep dropping for Snowy Grouper and Golden Tiles, again without success. Weather moved in on us, so we made the mad dash back to shore and home. Long couple days … no fish ☹

Wednesday was devoted to cleanup, re-fueling, and bait fishing.

Thursday, back to the reef. We started south and west of Big Pine, and found good suspended fish shows in 65-70 feet right over the edge of the reef. Anchored up, chum blocks in and fishing started. Finally, we started catching – not heavy bu on t we did start picking up small yellowtail and a big g triggerfish. We kind of bounced our way down the reef as the day went moving toward the east, looking for a better bite

We ended up east of big pine and anchored up on a spot I call Mushroom rock.  Previous times that I have fished the area the current was so strong we could not fish it well.  On this day, the current was pretty much slack, almost too slack.  Chum out, baits down, and we did continue to catch small yellow tail.  Just like fishing, Glen saw his deep grouper rod bend in half and he pulled up a really nice black grouper.   30 minutes later both tom and glen’s rods bent in half and we pulled in another pair of grouper.  Limit done!

Gotta brag on Glen’s fish.  It measured over 35 inches, probably a 25 pound fish.  All of the blacks were big … inch thick filets!  We ended the day with 3 beautiful Black Grouper, a handful of yellow tail, and a trigger fish.

Robin did her thing for us and made a feast … trigger fish sashimi, tuna poke, grilled shrimp and prosciutto, and grouper.

Friday, Tom and I went back out to the Mushroom rock to try and find some more grouper without success. We pulled off the rock and then started checking patch reefs for Mangrove Snapper. We got on one fishy looking hump and as soon as we put the chum bag in the water, we got a ball of small yellow tail in the chum line. Awesome sight, it looked like a gold ball in the water! We actually did get into a Mangrove Snapper bite and brought home some nice ones, but slow.

Saturday, the guys were planning to leave so we decided to take a quick trip in the back country to one of my favorite fishing cuts.   Chum out, live baits in hand, Robin puts a bait out and immediately gets a big Mangrove Snapper.  This spot is fun fishing, with everyone catching lots of fish, and also getting abused by the resident goliath groupers that live there.

All in all – fishing was hot and cold, but the company was fantastic, and we are officially back on the water again!

Later – Bo

Last update I had the fuel tank project through the major construction phase, and I sealed it up good so Robin and I could take our EPIC road trip to see Lilly, Kyle and Laura.

Now I am back at it, and spent the last month “making her pretty!”.

To do so, means sanding! Lots and lots of sanding.

Next up, it was fairing time. Fairing is a 2 part compound, kind of like bondo for the marine environment. I used it for leveling the floor and fiberglass seams.

Since I had “the patient open”  I went ahead and ground down around hatches and deck plates, filled screw holes and rebuilt with resin and chopped strand matt.

Fairing is another case of put product on and then sand it back off. I went around 3 iterations. Fun part was (not!) using the long sanding board. The long board is all about leveling, side to side, front to back. Wax on wax off, sand the floor left sand the floor right. That bad boy about broke my back and shoulders!

Finally, I called the heavy work done, and it was time to start painting. So I built my “paint booth” using a blue tarp supported by some 2×4’s and began the process.

I am using AlexSeal painting system which is composed of primers and topcoat paints, hardners, and thinners.  It is a bit like a science experiment, careful mixing of the products, lots of coats within specific timeframes.   It all starts with … sanding … every surface front to back with 180 grit, vacuum it up, and clean with solvent.  Then, three coats of primer looked like this ….

Followed by another round of sanding at 380 grit, make a couple more repairs and touch up. Then comes the top coats. My overall plan was to repaint from the gunnels down to help with color matching.

Also I applied a non-skid coat to the deck, so I started the painting process working under the gunnels down to a 6 inch wide coat on the deck. More to follow there.

This paint is awesome, nothing like painting a house. It is about the thickness of water and goes on very thin, requiring multiple coats. The paint system is designed around application by rollers, I used little 4 inch mohair ones. There is also a special additive that really flows out the topcoat and it is near spray quality. Crazy …

Next came the non-skid. I chose to use SoftSand for the grit, it is a fine grained rubber based product, and applied it using a broadcast method where I rolled out paint, then sprinkling the softsand over top.

This process went ok, but have to admit I was disappointed – the operator (yours truly) did not do a good job with consistency. I had to paint and spread the product in sections so I could reach it, and that is where I had coverage issues. I also taped off non-skid gutters around the outside of the deck, made a nice transition and clean lines.

Once dry, I swept up the excess SoftSand, and then made 2 additional topcoats to lock the non-skid in place. Pulled the tape … and call it done!

End result, pretty much showroom quality, I am extremely pleased with the end result. So now it is time to put it back together and get it back in the water.

Launch will be next weekend!? Grouper season opened May 1st, and I hear big mahi are offshore. Time to get back to fishing!

Last minute edit … one more picture. Looks good in the daylight!

Definitely not a fishing post! If you follow this blog, then you know we had a fuel tank failure on the woody too. So fishing for me has come to a halt, and it has been all about boat repair of late.

I spent the month of January gathering supplies, prepping the fuel tank coffin, getting the tank built, and getting stuff ready. Status on the first weekend in February …

Tank day finally came! Like all things you anticipate, the freight service missed a Friday delivery, and I lost a weekend! I was so mad …. 😦

Being a weekend warrior, that really hurt time wise. Patience finally paid off, and I got the tank delivered the next Monday! Very pleased, workmanship was spot on, epoxy coat looked good, and I got a chance to measure, scratch and plan the install and order additional parts (elbows, anti siphon valves, etc).

In the mean time, I templated, cut and laminated the floor panel from coosa board and 2 layers of 1708 fiberglass.

I also cut and laminated floor joists from coosa pieces

Install weekend! My neighbor jimmy has a bobcat, and his son, fishing bro matt and another helper came to the rescue.

I really underestimated the amount of foam I needed. I had bought a half gallon and ended up buying another gallon, and then had to make 2 runs to stock island to buy 2 more half gallons. I spent 600 dollars on frigging foam!! I had no idea 😦

There you have it – the rough install is done! I ended up putting 5 1708 laminate layers on the floor, and burned through 6 gallons of resin and two big buckets of cabasil. Also probably breathed enough dust to shorten my life 10 years!

Robin and I are going to head to see Laura, Kyle and Lilly week after next so I am at a good stopping point.

All in all, really happy with the result so far! When I get back to it, it is fairing to make all surfaces flat, and paint/non skid application. Then it is time to install hatches etc, and get back to fishing!

Phew!

Blogs are hard, when you start getting behind, it is a lot of work to catch back up. That allows my procrastination to kick in full blast! Time to break to log jam.

Kyle, Laura and Lilly came down to the keys for a long awaited pre Christmas visit! It seams like forever ago!

We even caught some fish!

we caught allot of fish!

We also had the event. After we took that trip I called the fuel man to fill the boat up. “Bear” filled up the Parker, I looked in the bilge and raw fuel was pouring into the bilge.

Panic set in, and we ended up filling every container we could find and siphoned out about 45 gallons of fuel. That was enough to stop it leaking in the bilge. I spent the next bit cleaning out the bilge and venting everything out and getting the boat on the trailer..

I tore everything apart and could see some suspicious areas where it looked like the tank was leaking. A couple more tests proved it – the tank had a hole and had to go.

Unfortunately, the deck is solid (no deck hatch), so the only way to fix it is to cut the deck up and redo the floor…. and that is what we are up to now.

I am having the tank built by custom marine fuel tanks in ft lauderdale. 173 gallons, 3/16 aluminum, and epoxy coated. Deliver expected in 2 weeks.

Here are the holes. About a 1/4 inch diameter clean through. There were a bunch of other deep pits lined up to fail next. that tank was definitely at the end of its life.

This brings us to now. Robin authorized me to get parts, so we went to ft lauderdale (pompano beach actually), and picked up the materials, and this weekend I turned the corner from tearing her apart to rebuilding!

Bonus – I got 2 new tools for the project, a Bosch 6” random orbit sander, and a nice makita 1 1/8 belt sander.

Then today I got the coffin cleaned out, sealed holes and bad spots, and hit it with gel coat to cure. Making progress!

Bad or good, I have to put it out there. We had a weather window on Saturday, and gave it another shot at a swordfish.

The plan was to go early, cross the reef and drop wahoo baits in the water as soon as we cleared the lobster pots, and high speed troll out to some Gray Tile spots, make a couple deep drops, and then move out to the Wall, and do the really deep drop for a swordfish.

The setup

In preparation, we dissected our setup on our last attempt. Although we did pretty well tackle and rig wise, we can always improve. So on the list: improve the connection between the braid mainline and our wind-on leader, upgrade the connection point for the weight, and simplify our light connections.

Paul bought a new spool of 200 pound leader, and we measured out 75 feet of line, and I tied it to the braid with an FG Knot (very smooth and strong knot). Then we put a hollow braid fingersplice on the leader to connect the weight. The final piece was we decided to just connect the lights directly to the swivel between the wind-on leader and the bait. Sorry about the picture, if you zoom in you can see the splice.

For bait I prepped a Bonita Belly strip bait, and Paul tied on a large trolling squid. Both were rigged with a glow in the dark rubber squid skirt. Paul also caught several barracuda earlier (he was going no-fish stir crazy) and we prepped as another strip bait that we held in reserve. We have a bit of a test underway. If you look at the Bonita rig (just below) the hook is sewed into the front of the bait, if you look at Paul’s squid, the hook is at the tail of it. Don’t know which is right, so we are trying both methods.

Let’s go fishing …

Off we went … we made it out to the Gray Tile drop area and made 3 drops in about 850 feet. No tile bites, but we did get a half dozen Black Belly Rose fish. Interesting little guys, colorful, big eyes, and spikes all over their heads.

We didn’t spend much time on the Tile drop, and rolled on out to the Wall. The area we fished was actually about 5 miles west of our previous attempt where there is a lot more aggressive drop at the edge.

We ended up making 4 drops, all of it drifting easterly with the gulf stream, and we used three different baits (bonita belly, squid and barracuda). Two drifts we kept the baits 100 feet off the bottom, and the other 2 drifts we put the baits around 30 feet off the bottom. That translates to having 1500 to 1800 line dropped to the bottom and back in, driving for around an hour with the current. Each time, the baits went down to depth and came back up without drama – nice and smooth, no tangles, lights blinking and squid glowing. No bites …. ☹

As for sword fishing, we are now 0 for 2 on trips, and 0 for 6 on actual drops, but enthusiasm is still high. We are using the right baits, in the right place, and our presentation is spot on. It is a matter of time!

In other news ….

We had another storm hit us dead center … 2020 just has to end! Big blow, lots of rain, but no damage to anything thank heavens.

Unfortunately my Sister and Brother-In-Law (Beth and Jim) lost their dock (boat is ok). They live on Manasota Key near Venice.

And the latest WoodyToo upgrade – I bought a big off-road light bar, and installed it on the tower console. We are running more and more before sunrise and after dark, and trust me, it is like a pitch black hole out there! This will be a big improvement on safety, and my blood pressure!

All for now, please pray for the hurricane season to end!

I did it again, I let things lapse a bit. It sure is easier when I keep up with it! Bare with me, this is a long post, and it was a tough one to get through. How to begin …

As most of you know we lost my Mom last month. It was an event that knocked the breath out of all of us, but we pulled together as a family, and celebrated her life together. Mom loved family, friends, food, her community and the water above all else! One of her sayings was “We are all blessed for our times on the water, but we are truly blessed to live on the water!”

She loved her condo on the Chesapeake Bay at Gwynn’s Island Virginia. They had the dining table at the windows looking down across Milford Haven toward the Hole In The Wall, and at night you could see the lights on Wolf Trap light. And all the seafood! Lordy lordy shrimp, crabs, oysters, clams, mussels, and fish of all types (I never saw her pass up a rare tuna steak!). All cooked as simply and delicately as possible! One day she and dad met us at the dock after tuna fishing, and she brought soy and wasabi. We had sushi right there at the cleaning table!

Thank you momma for showing us all that goodness!! Our memories together are precious and will be cherished forever!

Our camping saga begins!

I know this is a site about fishing, but Robin and I got COVID fever and were tired of not seeing our grandbaby Lilly! So we bought an RV, tricked it out a bit, and took off cross country for a great visit to Lexington Kentucky to visit Kyle, Laura and Lilly.

On the way to and fro, we took our time and drove “under” Cumberland Gap and visited the Smokey Mountains in Tennessee, stopped at a really nice park in Georgia, went to Jekyll Island on the coast and finally made the mad dash back to the Keys.

Back to fishing!

This has been a tough summer fishing since hurricane season started. We had several storm scares but thank heavens no direct hits. The poor folks on the gulf coast, they have had it rough. Around here in the keys it has been rainy/stormy since August, and one day we got 10.5 inches of rain! I have had to replace bilge pumps and float switches on both boats!

We did get out a couple times. Robin and I took the WoodyToo offshore for a day, and it was relatively dead out there. Finally, after hours of nothing we found a wooden beam floating around, and boom game on! 6 lines were in the water, 5 hooked up, and we landed 3. All on the surface caught on trolled ballyhoo. Nothing at all wrong with schoolie dolphin for dinner!

I also made a huge process upgrade. Boat gas delivered to the house!?! How cool is that?

Paul gave me the number of his fuel guy, called him up, they showed up the next day. Rec 90 fuel, 100 gallons minimum, better price that the Valero in Marathon, easy as pie! These guys have a new customer in me for sure. They even filled up my empty fuel cans, so both little and big boats taken care of!

Fall fishing begins ….

With fall hitting, things change around here. The winds are up, and the water is cooling down a bit. That brings bait in the backwaters and on the flats. Before too long, after our first cold fronts, the bait will push out to the Atlantic, which will stack the sportfish up on the reef. But for now, it is time to follow the big tides into the mangrove shorelines and fish!

Pilchards are the bait of choice, and I have been learning and practicing how to throw the cast net. I am getting better … but still throw my share of bananas!

With a load of pilchards in the live well, Robin cleaned up on a pair of redfish, both in the slot limit. I also caught a small goliath that was hanging under a mangrove root in less than a foot of water. We had one of the redfish for dinner and released the other. We also saw some big snook, small tarpon, and a bunch of sharks in the skinny water. Lots of fun for sure!

Fall brings Stone Crabs!

October 15 is the opening of stone Crab season, which have to be my favorite shellfish. It is a trap fishery and for recreational folks and we are allowed 5 traps a per person. With Paul previously a commercial crab fisherman, he is the resident expert so we joined forces with him and pooled our traps together giving us a nice set. Weekend before last, we checked the traps for the first time since the season opened.

First things first, we needed bait for the traps. Folks use hogs feet, or fish parts, for bait, and I am usually asked to keep all the lady fish along with the heads and trimmings from anything we catch. Bottom line, stinky and cheap is the key. Paul’s solution to the bait is harvest stingrays. How do you get them? I thought you would never ask!!

There we were (all good stories start this way), headed out onto the flats in Paul’s bully boat with 2 old speargun spears lashed to poles with floats tied on them.

We cruised the flats on a plane looking for tell tale mud “puffs” from stingrays getting spooked by the boat. As soon as we spot one, turn around and try to sight him. Then get in close and hit them with the harpoon. The ray takes off, we chase the float down and get a gaff in him and harvest the ray as quickly as possible.

I have to say it was quite entertaining, a lot of hard work, and it is crazy how many rays are out there. We ended up with 2 both around 50 pounds, and after cleaning them we filled 120-quart cooler with enough bait to fill all of our crab traps (plus some leftover).

Sunday morning, we went and pulled the traps. Paul invited his friend Matt to join us so we had one boat driver and two trap pullers. It went pretty much like you expect, find the trapline, grab the buoy, pull the trap up on the boat, harvest the crab claws, rebait and reset the trap.

It is a cool and sustainable fishery, if you pull the claw right, the crab swims away with the only thing hurt being his pride! I think we did great, out of 17 traps we harvested around 10 pounds of claws. All different sizes with a bunch of really big ones!

Best part about harvesting stone crabs … dinner! We made it a neighborhood event and feast! Lots of fun, awesome eats and great company!

Fishing upgrades!

Next on the hit parade, is “hardening” the WoodyToo and getting serious about our deep bottom fishing. We invited Paul, Thuy and the girls over to go swimming, and Paul and I sat down and had a few beers and talked fishing (imagine that).

We focused on two things, first I started a log and picked Paul’s brain and documented each fish species I could think of along with the when, where and how to find and catch them. Where we live, pretty much every fish species that lives in the tropical atlantic will swim within striking distance of our island. Time to get serious, after all, that is why we live here! I plan on using this blog to record our progress and call out our successes and failures.

It begins with The Book!

Second, Paul dissected my fishing setup on the WoodyToo in terms of deep-water fishing. The results (this go-around anyway –. I needed to revamp the anchoring system, improve my live well water flow capacity, and work through cockpit and running lights (we are leaving the dock earlier and earlier, and I need some form of headlights).

We also made the command decision that we have to try for a swordfish (see the previous paragraph) which means taking deep dropping to a new level.

Off to the races – or upgrades! Robin pretty much shook her head, told me I was nuts, confirmed that I will never be able to retire, and then looked the other way.

I bought a 35 gallon Husky trash can, 600 feet of ½ inch anchor line, 30 foot BBB chain, got my polyball and ring together and boom, new anchor system! With 600 feet of anchor line, we should be able to anchor in 300 feet of water (given a decent sea state).

I also upgraded my livewell pump from 800 gallon per hour to 1100 GPH. I am am still thinking through the lighting setup.

Game on

Finally, on Halloween, we finally got the weather window we needed to get offshore and try the new goodies. Paul, Matt and I were the crew (Robin pretty much said “have fun boys!).

The plan was to drop anchor in 260 feet of water on some structure where we caught a couple vermilion snapper a couple months ago. Drop chum sand-balls, and live baitfish looking for an early morning Mutton Snapper bite. Then throttle up and head for “the wall” pulling Wahoo baits on the high-speed troll. Once we hit the wall make a couple Swordfish drifts, and then high-speed troll back in, and call it a day.

Preparation for the trip was awesome! Matt went to Cudjoe Sales and picked up some Mac-Daddy wahoo baits (Yozori Bonita, and some big lip divers),

Paul picked up hooks and big glow squid skirts. I had chum and a couple bonita in the freezer. We had a rigging party Friday night and put the pieces together and loaded the boat.

Saturday morning came and out to sea we went. Saturday afternoon came and we came back home to the lift. That is how many fish we caught ☹. Heavy sigh …

We did have a great day, and I have to tell fishing stories wether we catch them or not!

We got out and anchored on the Vermillion spot. The depth finder was lit up, I mean beautiful. Sandballs in the water, fish came in under the boat. Live baits down – nothing. We added in some cut bait, I even put down dolphin roe …. Nothing. Paul tied up a chicken rig (three dropper loops with small hooks) tipped with squid, dropped it and filled up all 3 hooks with Amilico Jacks. Enough said time to move on….

We ended up anchoring twice on the spot, and the new anchor system really worked well. On our first drop we put almost all 600 feet of the line in the water!

Off we go toward the wall, with a spread of three wahoo baits in the water, the Yozuri, one of my Red and Black weighted squids, and a 50 foot lipped diver. For a high-speed troll, the boat runs best at about 8.5 – 9 knots and at that speed it was an hour and a half run out to the edge.

The spread really ran well, no tangle issues, a ton of strain on the tackle, but it all ran smoothly. About halfway out, I noticed the Yozuri rod looked like it lost tension. We pulled it in and sure enough the lure was gone … closer examination shows we were bit off. I had crimped the lure on brand new 250# stranded steel cable, and the break was as clean as if you did it with side cutters. Absolutely a wahoo bite, the reel did not even make a chirp.

We trolled on out to the wall and set out the deep drop baits for swordfish.

This is as technical a fishery as it gets (not for the faint of hearts). There is plenty of opportunity to really screw it up, and the real potential of hooking an absolute beast. On top of that, it was our first time dropping for swords, so the learning hats were on tight.

The rig we used is pictured below:

We sewed a bait (whole squid and a Bonita belly) onto a hook with a glow rubber squid-skirt on top of it using a 400 pound test leader. We attached the bait rig to a 150 foot 250 pound test wind on leader that I tied Friday night. 6 foot in front of the bait, we hooked a deep drop disco flashing light using a long line clip, 25 feet in front of that another clipped on disco light, and then we clipped an 8 pound weight at the leader to braid connection point.

We figured out the drift conditions in the sea state, current and wind, and Paul moved us to where the drift would take us east paralleling the middle of the wall in 1500 feet of water.

The objective is never allow any slack in the rig, and to get it down to 100 feet off the bottom. Then control the boat and drift to keep the line straight up an down.

Paul put the boat in gear slowly, and Matt and I fed the bait and leader out behind the boat, and down, down, down it went using the electric reel until it hit 500 meters (my line counter is only in meters – so we had to do that math too). We then eased off the throttle and kept the drift straight until the line swung down directly under us. Once the line was straight up and down, I let the rig all the way until we bounced on the bottom, and then I pulled it 100 feet back up indexing us to the right depth.

The second part of all this is the preparation for if we hooked one! We knew we were under-tackled. My electric reel is pretty nice, but if we hooked into a 400 pound swordfish we would be in for a ride and a half. So we tried to get the odds in our favor a bit. My brother-in-law gave me our old Fly-Gaff which is an 8 foot shaft with a removable gaff head tied to 20 foot of line. Theory being get the gaff head in the fish, and tie the line off to a cleat on the boat. Old-school stuff there!

Paul also borrowed a harpoon from a buddy of his with 500 feet of line attached to the dart. We would tie the harpoon to my poly-ball, hit the fish with the dart and let him take the whole thing out to sea if he wanted to and we would chase the polyball down like a bobber.

We spent 3 hours and made 2 drifts. First drift with the squid bait, and the second with a Bonita belly, but no bites either time.

The rig and setup ran flawlessly. Both times when we brought the baits up, there were no tangles and everything looked great. We were in the right spot and the drift lines were perfect. Bottom line, we were on our game, we fished where they lived, and the bait was what they eat. That is fishing, we just did not get a bite.

We trolled on back home, and made it in safe and without issues, other than an empty fish box. Looking forward to trying it again!

Phew – that is all folks for the update. Will do my best to keep them coming!

I need to start out here, lobster season so far has been a bust. Robin and I still have not found them. We have found some killer new structure and areas to fish and dive for them though…. But no oversized craw fish to speak of yet.

Also, honorable mention. this week was shark week, and they did a special about “Big Moe” which is a 17 foot hammerhead that joins us here in Bahia Honda and the 7 mile bridge during the tarpon run. I was skeptical but Paul said they know the film crew, and Big Moe is the real deal! Makes me feel real comfy diving around here!

https://meaww.com/shark-week-2020-monster-under-the-bridge-florida-keys-seven-mile-bridg-hammerhead-big-moe

Sunday, Robin and I went offshore with our neighbors Paul and Thuy. The plan was to run out offshore early, set up on the dolphin and tuna bite, and search for good bottom structure for our first deep drop shot. We had ballyhoo, Bonita and squid for bait.

We ran out to 750 feet of water and started seeing life. We slowed the boat down, put baits in the water, and pretty much immediately got into fish. The dolphin were under birds and they were hungry!

We also had 2 different runs on pretty big fish that dumped a ton of line off the reels, and both broke off. They hit my light tuna feathers on 40 pound leaders and both broke off at the hook. Who knows what they were, but judging by what we were catching they were most likely larger dolphin.

On to the deep dropping. Paul was driving the boat from the tower in search of the right structure. We stopped in 2 different areas, one had a pretty good rise in the bottom, and the second had a couple good rocky looking places.

We built the rigs we used on the bench at home. Basically three dropper loops with 10/0 circle hooks crimped on 200 pound mono and attached with heavy duty 3 way swivels. Each hook was tipped with a 7 inch glow worm. We used a 40 pound test loop for the weight (so we can break it off if it gets stuck). And on top of the rig we clipped on a deep drop strobe light. The saying is “no light no bite!”

Game on – the reel is pretty straight forward. It has 800 yards of 100 pound braid. It’s line counter is in meters, and the writing is in Japanese characters! So we all were doing the math … how do you convert feet to meters …. 850 feet … somewhere around 250 meters …

Just like grouper fishing in 60 feet of water. The braid really cuts the water, and Paul kept working the boat so that the line stayed as straight up and down as possible. I was manning the reel and kept the bait so you could see the weight bounce off the bottom in the trough of a wave. It gets hypnotic!

Big is life .. tap tap tap goes the rod tip, and I throw it in retrieve mode. If you hook up the rod bends in half. Like all grouper bites the fight is all about the first 60 seconds, when you hook it you have to keep it from getting back in it’s hole. We got a solid hookup, rod bent in half and we got that sucker off the bottom!

The electric made steady progress up the water column until we hit 50 meters to the surface. Then I felt a ton of kicking and boom things went the other direction – line going out. I had the drag cranked down as hard as I could but we could barely stop it and could not get it coming back up.

We learned allot about the reel, when it can’t make progress retrieving line the motor shuts off, and you have to turn it off and back on to restart it. Freaked me out a bit – I thought I was going to have to hand crank a sea monster up from the deep and that I burned up my new reel. Thank goodness ..

After a half hour of tug of war I finally started to get it coming back up. And at 20 meters below the boat I felt something let go and it came right up. We started seeing color and saw all we had left was a big head and with large shark following. Not sure the variety, but I know the sucker had teeth!

That would have been a big slob of a grouper! It was hooked perfect in the corner of the mouth, and we got it off the bottom! Two big wins, but we had to pay our taxes to the sea gods I guess!

We dropped 2 more times without success, got bites, but no hook ups. We came on back home and when we hit the reef it was drop dead gorgeous!

Cleaning table shot …

Paul and Thuy had a big family meet up that evening so they took the head and made fish head soup .. and threw big slabs of dolphin on the grill.

We were not that exotic, and had a simple blackened mahi dish with a nice salad and potatoes. But the night before Robin made a killer snapper dish – Caribbean style poached snapper in banana leaf … yum!

Living is pretty tough down here in the keys! Until next time …

Pretty quiet here on Big Pine Key, we had our first tropical system scare (went on by thank heavens) and the opening of lobster mini season. So let’s get down to it!

Mini season came and went with a whimper. As most folks know the Florida FWC holds a 2-day lobster mini season on the last Wednesday and Thursday in July. It is a big tourist draw, and man they came! I swear every other car on route 1 was towing a boat! Unfortunately I had to work so we did not join the mayhem, but did get out for a couple hours after work opening day.

We scored 4 lobsters, perfect for dinner, and they were tasty!

Saturday robin and I went out and dove our favorite go-to spots covering upper harbor, Spanish and Rocky channels. My first tank dives of the year (awesome), and also found some new spots. The results ….

Nothing to see here folks, it was not good out there.

On to bigger and better things. I got a new toy, it is time to go deep, and somehow I was able to talk robin into buying my first electric reel. It is a Banax Kaigen loaded with 800 yards of 100 pound super thin braid. I repurposed my bent but planer rod and mounted the reel to it. Pretty sexy! Next, I installed and wired a 20amp circuit and plugs to the battery switch, and mounted it under the starboard gunnel. Our objective – bottom fishing in 750+ feet!

When mom and dad came to visit, they brought some old tackle that my brother-in-law Jim had kicking around. Included was one of my old Sam Scott 50 pound class rods from the BS Minnow! I did not hesitate and put my 9/0 planer reel on that pup and got it back into production!

What is a BS Minnow you ask??? It was my first sport fishing boat, co-captained with my buddy Dennis Brenson, who we believe is now in Costa Rica married to a young lady named Rosita. Well, he went down there and we have not seen him since! I even called his house one time …. no English spoken there, I gave up. Good luck and god bless my friend! 🙂

The BS Minnow was a 24 fool Albemarle with a 271hp Volvo engine and a duo prop out drive. She was an absolute hot rod, a ton of fun and caught a lot of fish. Circa mid-80’s I think. Check her out!

That’s the update – hope to get a weather break and try that deep drop outfit out! Also, if anyone knows where I can find lobsters please send directions!

Until next time ….