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Everglades National Park - Flamingo
Capt. Bob LeMay
June 11, 2003
Flamingo - Saltwater Fishing Report
Flamingo
The Gulf coast, north and south of the Shark River area continues to provide great opportunities for every kind of gear and style of fishing. Every day it's steady action with small tarpon from 10 to 30lbs, snook, speckled trout, snapper, small grouper and the occasional jack crevalle in the 10 to 20lb range... Our best snook this week was a solid 15lb fish on spinning gear caught by Jaime Rivero, a regular visitor from Mexico. We're taking them on lures and bait every day near shorelines with downed trees. Find the right current line and it's speckled trout every cast from 16 to 20" mixed in with small gag grouper and good sized mangrove snapper on bucktails worked across current right on the bottom. Along with 10 or more different species we've also been catching and releasing sharks up to about 9' every day. The bigger ones are just a bit too big... We've released at boatside Bulls, Lemons, Blacktips, and one Great Hammerhead. There appears to be large numbers of baby Blacktips around now. They're so aggressive that 3 or 4 at a time will chase lures back to the boat then swim around the skiff looking for something to bite until we leave...
Although Flamingo is hot and buggy during summer, the fishing is great and we're having it mostly to ourselves. Many days you'll only see one or two other trailers at the inside ramp.
Biscayne Nights
Finally we had a chance to visit a few night spots last night for baby tarpon with fly rods and found the fish as hungry as ever. All of the bridges between Miami and Miami Beach have good sight fishing for small (and not so small) tarpon every night all summer long. Sonny Puma, visiting his brother from California, got his first tarpon on fly last night. It was about 40lbs on a #8 rod and a Night Fly. Since a #8 rod is probably more suited for bonefish he really had his hands full. That fish towed our skiff some distance from the bridge where Sonny sighted and cast to him. Larry Puma had one on that was even larger but it wore through the shock tippet during a long run down current from the bridge. We ending the evening with shots at snook that were definitely in the "big mama" category. All of the ones at one light were in the 15 to 20lb range. None were in an eating mode, however, since we found them right at the end of the tide... I'll be paying those fish another visit!
Tight Lines
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