I have to be in Miami this week as a Recreational Fisherman Advisor/Witness for the Gulf of Mexico SEDAR Red Grouper Assessment workshop. So I guess that means I get to spend 3 days hanging out with fisheries biologists and statisticians figuring out how to count all the Red Grouper in the Gulf of Mexico. It will be interesting in a geeky kind of way, and definitely a learning process. It is also one more step networking and understanding our fisheries management process, that as folks who know me understand that I am wildly passionate, and a bit outspoken about! It also gives me an excuse to get two back to back weekends at our place on Big Pine … thus the need for an update.
This is not much of a fish story, as the title says – lazy July days around here!
We were welcomed back with another elusive key deer encounter … these two gentlemen have been eating on the Mangos falling from a tree in our neighbor’s yard. Can’t say I blame them, I like a good Mango Margarita my own self, but they drive my dogs nuts! So lots of barking and deer chasing going on around here!
Last weekend we took the Woody Too offshore on Friday for a couple hours and once again had a bad mechanical surprise. When I throttled up to head home I got a low oil pressure alarm and the Yamaha throttled down to 2,000 rpm. Multiple restarts resulted in the same condition, so we ended up trolling home …. A 3 hour ride. If you recall we had just had the oil pump replaces due to an oil leak, so this definitely got my attention! When I got back I hooked it up to the YDS and the computer spit out fault codes for inconsistent oil pressure indications, and I consulted with Marshall at Fast Action Marine and we both concurred it was time to replace the sender. Long story short, I spent Friday replacing the sender and a test drive, and all looks good to go.
Saturday the winds and seas were still up, so we spent the day on the skiff doing some lobster scouting, and looking for new likely spots. Off we go down the canal … I dream of that view when we are not here, we are definitely smitten by the keys life!
Harlan (pinerwhaoo) mentioned that they were starting to stack up, and good heavens I agree! Just about everywhere we went there were Lobsters hiding where you would expect it! Can’t wait for a couple weeks when we can go get em! We had a great day on Saturday with no pressures and nothing to do but explore new spots. There are so many hidden gems in the back country, some marked but most just randomly about … can anyone name this coral head?
On Sunday we wondered offshore, and were met with birds and bait crashing as soon as we crossed the reef. As far as the eye could see in 100 to 175 feet the water was busting with bonitos pounding small fry. It was quite the sight, and we spend an hour or so playing with them. We caught a couple on small feathers.
We ended up pushing on out to 600 feet and found a bunch of scattered weedlines, full of small flying fish and pretty good groups of birds working them, but very little as far as chewing. We did end up with a pair of decent fish out of the deal. All in all fairly slow day, but the best news … the boat ran perfectly. Knock on wood!!!!
Nothing wrong with Mahi served Lazy Days style!
Last night the winds dropped and the water became a mirror. How about this for an after sunset picture of our back yard!
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Inshore goofing off 6-21-2015
Robin and I spent Father’s Day generally goofing off. We put the top up on the lil woody and scooted out to the Atlantic to snorkel on some big coral heads.
On our way we went through some new territory and cut through the pass at cooks island. A couple cool things – it cuts off about 3 miles, it dumps you in the Atlantic by Beyoncé’s house, and most important I only ran aground once!
Once through cook island pass you are in a bunch of big coral heads that are supposedly full of hogfish. Well I saw one 6 inch hogfish, but the water was gin clear and the coral beautiful! Look at this handsome devil!
Thunderstorms forced us to go to our backup plan, so we ran down thru no name bridge and over to rocky channel. We caught a bunch of snapper throwing gulps, only one cooler worthy credit to robin.
Onward we went and ended circumnavigating big pine to the east and north. Long way on the lil woody! Took some pictures of the sights. Ended up with 1 more snapper in the cooler, this time mine!
Great day to be in the keys!
Offshore big pine 6-20
Got the call on Wednesday that the boat was fixed and ready to go back in the water. So the Robin and I scrambled and headed back down Thursday night. We launched her on Friday at my neighbor Alan’s ramp and ran her down to Dolphin Marina for a quick test drive and filled her with fuel. I want to give a shameless plug for Marshall and his team at Fast Action Marine on Big Pine. He completed the job at the price and in the time line he quoted me, and did an outstanding job. The Woodytoo has a 12 year old Yamaha F225, and the oil pump seals failed blowing oil all over everything. We nursed her back home from way offshore a couple weeks ago by adding oil and watching things closely. The oil pump is located in the mid-section of the engine and getting to it was more that I wanted to handle myself. Looks to me like I have found my go-to mechanic here on Big Pine!
My welcoming committee met me Thursday night when we got to the house. I went to put some stuff in the garbage and was surrounded by the “elusive and endangered” key deer. There was nine in total in this group …
Saturday morning we loaded up and headed offshore. The crew for the day was my wife Robin, neighbor Alan, his best friend Jamie and myself. The water was beautiful, and a lot flatter than I had expected.
The he reports that we got from folks matched what I was seeing on the temp SST charts and we headed out deep. We saw absolutely nothing from the reef all the way offshore, and I finally throttled down at the wall. We spent the morning empty handed, working scattered weeds and birds from 1200 to 800 feet.
As the afternoon sun got hot hot things got better and we saw more and more bird and bait activity. Big as life the bit finally turned on like someone threw a switch! We ended up being escorted by a trio of frigate birds that hung with us for several hours.
We never saw anything big, but ended with a nice box full of fish. Best part was the good company. It was great to get to know Alan better, and the banter between he and Jamie was hilarious! Those guys are welcome company with Robin and I anytime!
Special callout to our dog Rebel … he loves to photobomb the fish pics!
The end result, robin made some killer open faced mahi sandwiches! Yowsers!
Bo
Fishing the second half: June vacation 2015
The second half of our late spring vacation brought two of my best friends down from Virginia. Tom and Glen and I have fished together for 25 + years, mostly off Virginia Beach and the Outer Banks. This is their second annual trip down to BPK, and I have looked forward to having them down again all year long!
Bo, Glen, and TomThe weather really calmed down which made the call for heading offshore an easy one on Thursday. We had found the fish the previous weekend out beyond 700 feet, so we decided to run for the roses and head out toward the wall. It appeared to be the right call for us, because we really did not see anything interesting until we hit the lumps out in the 850 range straight out of BPK, and ran into scattered weeds and a bunch of birds. We worked the area and generally out to sea while picking up a few scattered fish, mostly schoolies.
Boys will be boysWe finally did run into a consistent bite and some better quality fish out at 1200 feet, working along the wall. There we found a good weedline, and some solid current breaks with scattered birds, and the area produced well. We had a go-pro with us, and my daughter put together a vine on one of the gaffers we caught – I call it the “hand of god” that poor mahi was minding it’s own business, and then boom – clean and jerk into the cooler!
What was really impressive out there was the billfish. We had one Blue Marlin light up and explode on the current break right in front of us, and grayhounded what seamed like forever and out of sight. We also saw at least 5 other bills’ (most likely sails) free jumping around us through the afternoon. Nothing in the baits though. We ended up with a nice group of decent dolphin, and passed up a zillion schoolies out there.
Robin & Tom with the Mahi’sOn Friday, we headed back out toward the wall for another shot at them. We put in at 900 feet under a trio of frigate birds, and right into the fish. Immediately we nailed a triple of gaffer dolphin, then were swamped with schoolies, and then hit another gaffer. The morning really was looking good when bam – we hooked and landed our first sail since we got our place down on BPK. The honors went to my wife Robin, who did a great job on the rod and reel, and was hooting and hollering the whole time! What fun!!!!
Keys sailAfter we released the sail, I noticed a really bad fricking oil slick behind the boat. Scary thing 20+ miles offshore! Discretion is the better part of valor, so we packed it up and rolled the Woodytoo back home. Luckily I have spare oil on board, and we were able to get her back home without issue. Looks like I blew a seal on the oil pump, and now have it under the wrench. However, the couple hours we were out there on Friday was the best offshore action I have seen this year. We dropped down on the fish, and they were chewing! What a hoot!!!
We spend the rest of the weekend on the skiff running around inshore, and I took the guys on a tour of the Content and Sawyer keys, Upper Harbor Key, the S-curves, and out toward Bullfrog bank. We caught a bunch of Mangroves, and flat out enjoyed fishing and snorkeling in the beautiful backwaters.
So, great time, great friends and great fishing. Bummer about breaking the boat, but we stayed upbeat and optimistic and really came through with our inshore plan B. The boat is in the shop, and hopefully the damage (and repair expense) is as minimal as possible.
Fish Big Pine.
My wife and I are down in BPK for two weeks that are kind of split in half. This past week our daughter joined us, she is currently living in Texas doing a PHD program at Texas Tech in Lubbock. She is certainly happy to get away from all the storms out there, and also get back on salty water! She grew up fishing and spent most of her early years either on a horse, or with a rod and reel in her hand.
Friday the wind was still honking, so we took the skiff up to the content keys area and did some touring, drifted the flats, and snorkeling. I don’t think the water can be any prettier than this …..
When the tide turned around we spent the afternoon drifting some flats. My wife caught this tasty mutton throwing a gulp shrimp on 12 pound test. Really great fight in 3 foot of water with that light rod! We also picked up a bunch of mangroves, and had a nice snapper dinner!
Saturday, we took the woodytoo offshore, seas were crazy sloppy, kind of all over the place, and the weeds were thick and scattered. So it made it difficult in cockpit but we managed through it. We started in close without any luck and worked our way out generally to the humps straight south of looe key. Very, very slow all morning. When we got to 650 ish and we found some better weed lines, a bunch of birds, and started picking up dolphin. In the middle of the flurry, we had a blue marlin smash a blue and white Hawaiian eye rigged with a horse ballyhoo on the short rigger but it did not come tight. We freespooled and he picked it up again and we had it for about 15 seconds peeling line and then gone again. Close!!! When we got back to the house my daughter decided to beat me with a fish … I guess she was mad at me for missing the blue one!
Sunday calm winds and seas made for a wonderful ride! We ran straight out to the 650 mark and again found scattered weeds and nothing really biting! Do these fish have keys disease? They don’t seem to want to bite until the afternoon! We ended up running out toward the wall, and found a couple awesome weedlines in 850 or so and started steadily picking up fish. There always seems to be a story with us – but I put my wahoo planer down and it got wacked hard by a decent dolphin. I have the drag cranked hard on that outfit so the fish waterski’d straight to the surface. As I wound it in toward the boat what looked like a mako wide head and shoulders came grayhounding up from behind it and smashed the fish. Don’t know for sure about if it was a mako or not, it was certainly big and acted like one. I run that rig on wire, too bad he missed the hook! End result:
There you go, long winded fish story, but a lot on! Next week I have some of my old navy buddies coming down and we will do it again! Best part of it all this week was spending quality time with my girls, I am a lucky guy!
Bo
Gorham Fishing Team 