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What's Biting?
Holy Sailfish! A strong cold front passed through South Florida last last week and flipped the switch on Sailfishing in a big way. The bite has been nothing short of world class. It should only continue to improve as the winter progresses and more fronts push bodies of fish down the coast.
Congratulations to the Silver Sailfish Derby for setting a new tournament record in the 75th anniversary of the Derby last week. 46
boats combined to release near 1,200 fish in 3 days! Over 650 fish were
released on Day 1 of the tournament with the Get Lit team posting 36 of
those releases. The FishHead Soup sponsored Encore Fishing Team posted a great ratio in the Derby, going 32/38. Nice job guys! The Jupiter Billfish tournament just concluded today as well. Congratulations to Doing it All, winners of the live bait division and Outlaw, top boat in the troller's division. Doing it All and Miss Annie battled back and forth all day long today with numerous lead changes, but it was Daryl Deka's Doing it All team
with key releases in the last few minutes of the tournament that pushed
them into the winner's circle with 39 total releases.
The Wahoo bite has been very good off the Southeast coast of Florida in December on into January. If you don't mind buring the fuel, the Wahoo fishing on the other side has been pretty good as well. The best Wahoo reports in the Bahamas have been coming from the South.
While
you can't keep them due to the seasonal closure, the grouper fishing
has been very good along the reef as well, particularly for Gag
Groupers. Beware, they are bruisers. Be prepared to lose more than you catch!
What's Hot?
SPOOL 4 FREE!!
No typos here! Registered teams in the Sailfish Challenge can get 4 reels filled with Diamond Fishing Line for FREE. How? Simply,
stop by a participating tackle shop with your coupon you receive after
you've registered, pay to have 4 reels filled with Diamond Line and you can get an additional 4 reels of equal size or smaller filled with Diamond line for absolutely free!
There's never been a better opportunity to spool up with the #1 monofilament in the world. Below is a list of participating shops you can visit for the Spool 4 Free Promotion. Remember, you must be a registered team in the Sailfish Challenge. Registration is now open online at www.sailfishchallenge.com For info regarding the promotion, contact 954-783-1320.
Participating Stores:
South Locations:
Captain Harry's: 305-374-4661
Crook & Crook: 305-854-0005
El Capitan: 305-635-7500
Hopkins Carter: 305-635-7377
Central Locations:
Chaos Rods: 954-304-0872
Custom Rod & Reel: 954-781-5600
LMR: 954-525-2592
Ray's Offshore: 561-394-6497
RJ Boyle: 954-420-5001
T&R Tackle: 954-776-1055
North Locations:
Fisherman Center: 561-844-5150
Whites Tackle: 772-461-6909
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Ask the Pros
Subscriber asked..."On windy days, I'm having trouble keeping my furthest kite bait in the water. Any tips?"
There are a number of things that could be causing this issue and a number of things you can do to prevent it from happening. For starters, your kite clips may be too far apart for those conditions. Remember,
the further you space your clips apart, the further your long bait will
be away from the boat once you deploy the other baits closer to the
boat. You could try shortening your clip spacing by about 10 or 15 feet and see if that helps.
If you are not fishing an egg sinker or some form of lead above your leader, you will definitel want to do so. Choose your lead size based on the strength of the wind and the size of the bait you are fishing. On really windy days it may be tough to fish smaller baits like Pilchards or Herring at long distances from the boat. Don't be afraid to mix in a 2 oz lead if you need to. Better to make sure your bait spends more time in the water than out of the water.
You
may also be having trouble because the wind is blowing the kite clip up
the kite line and causing the bait to lift out of the water. There are a number of ways you can remedy this issue. One
of the easiest ways is to drill out a small hole in the clip and twist
on about 4 or 5 inches of copper wire through the hole you drilled out. Right
before you send the kite cllip away from the boat, make a couple of
twists with the wire behind the barrel swivel that will carry the clip
away from the boat. This will hold the clip in place and keep it from blowing up the line. When
the clip returns to the boat as you are reeling in the kite, the wire
will naturally pull lose from teh swivel and allow it to carry though
the kite rod back on to the reel.
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It's
not often that you get to write about quadruple digit Sailfish releases
in a tournament, however, in the case of the 75th annual Silver
Sailfish Derby, hosted by the West Palm Beach Fishing Club on Jan 5-7,
that is exactly what happened. There was a buzz in the air inside the historic fishing club building on the night of the kickoff party. Word traveled fast throughout the fleet as boats returned from fishing the day prior to the start of the tournament. 39 releases for the Reely Tight, 44 releases for Weez in the Keys, 30 releases for High Stakes, 24 releases for Sandman! The first true cold front of the season had the fish pouring through in a feeding frenzy!
Teams
realized quickly that they were going to need to bring their game face
for day 1 of the tournament in order to keep up with the blistering pace
that some of the boats would be likely to post.
From the onset of the 8am lines in announcement, it was pure pandemonium. Prior to the 2012 event, the single day record for the Derby was 258 releases by a field of 50 boats. That record was shattered in the 2012 event within the first 3 hours of the tournament - over 270 fish were released. The hottest bite was between Juno Pier and Jupiter Inlet outside of 200 feet of water. By the end of the day, a record setting 659 Sailfish were released - an average of 1.37 Sailfsh reports per minute! Several boats posted over 20 releases in the tournament, with 1 of them, Get Lit, eclipsing the 30 fish mark. Get Lit released 36 fish on Day 1.
While Day 2 did not produce the same intensity of fishing as day 1, by any other standard the fishing was still spectacular. 356 Sailfish were released on day 2 bringing the 2-day tally to 1,024 releases! Get Lit, Palacio de los Jugos and Sandman each had 16 releases. Get Lit still maintained a commanding lead with 52 total releases in the tournament. Sandman was the closest boat to them with 39 releases.
As the wind dropped out on day 3 so did the pace of the fishing. Jichi won the day with 8 releases. Contributions
from the rest of the field brought the 3-day total to 1,174 releases,
an average of 25.52 releases per boat! If that's not world class
fishing, I don't know what is. Get Lit commondeered the lead on Day 1 and never gave it up. They finished the tournament with 58 total releases. The Derby provided a great documentation of the strength of this fishery. We
look forward to many more tournament stories just like this one thanks
in great part to the billfish conservation practices of recreational
fishermen up and down the coast over the years.
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Soup du Jour
Yeeee Hawwww! I
don't know if this hillbilly from West Virginia knew how rare this
catch was, but Ryan Saxe, a high school principal from Milton, WV caught
this juvenile Tiger Shark on the reef outside of Boca Inlet on New
Year's Eve! While
Tiger Sharks are more common offshore and in the waters off the
Bahamas, they are far less common along the coastal waters here in South
Florida. This fish was caught in 60 feet of water on straight mono and a circle hook. She was released in healthy condition. Truly a beautiful fish. Nice job cuz!
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