Biscayne Bay Bones
Capt. Carl Ball
August 3, 2009
Biscayne Bay - Saltwater Fishing Report
Flats fishing in Biscayne Bay this past week sure had its ups and downs. Between bad weather and bad luck I managed a couple banner days.
Fishing with me on Thursday were Josh Brown and Shawn Fairbanks from LMR Custom Rods in Fort Lauderdale. If you need anything for fishing these guys are the "Best". The goal was to catch Shawn his first bonefish. Mission accomplished. Shawn caught a nice 6 lb bonefish first and Josh backed him up with a 10 lb bonefish. At the next spot we found a very large muddy area referred to as a "house mud" which was being made by a school of bonefish in the 2-2.5 lb range. We caught 4 of those and left them biting.
These livewell revived bonefish were caught with live shrimp.
On Friday, Todd Hall with daughter Jennifer and friend Lindsey just wanted to bend a rod and have some fun. I took them to a ladyfish spot that was on fire. The trio got bit on every cast and landed several of the jumpy speedsters. While drifting for sharks Lindsey caught a 20 lb barracuda. During another drift we came into a "house mud" full of hungry bonefish. The well placed shrimp netted Jennifer this 7 lb bonefish.
Saturday, day two for Todd Hall, now fishing with brother-in-law Ron, who wanted in on some shark action, and found themselves at the ladyfish hole catching one after another. On the first drift for a shark Ron landed a nice barracuda of about 15 lb. The big sharks were slow to come and gave us the cold shoulder when they did. So I ran to try another spot which paid off. Todd hooked 2 black tips and a 150-200 lb lemon shark. While shark fishing, a permit swam across our path only to bump into our deployed crab. The permit ate the crab and was lost to the sea fans within seconds.
Sunday was a rare treat for me. I got to take my wife Debbie fishing. She got to work on her casting skills while I worked on fish finding. This was the really bad luck day. I don't want to relive it so I am making it brief. The first permit broke us off on structure, the second and third permit wiggled off the hook (I don't know how). The forth permit ate the crab a fraction of a second after the hook must have fallen out of the crab. Again, I don't know how. At one spot we had 10 to 15 shots at bonefish but no bites. I don't know. It just wasn't meant to be.
Biscayne Bay Fishing Forecast:
More bonefish and permit. The permit fishing is the best this time of the year through October.
Target Species:
bonefish, permit, tarpon, sharks
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