SAILFISH SAILFISH AND MORE SAILFISH
Capt. Nick Cremasco
January 14, 2012
Stuart - Saltwater Fishing Report
Well it's that time of year and after the first major cold blast of the season in early January the fishing for sailfish did not disappoint. Single day records and catch total records fell in amazing fashion along with single day boat records. Fishing for sailfish since the beginning of January has probably been the best it has been in over 20 years. The thing is we have said that for the past two years also. This means we have great things to look forward to in the upcoming years and the rest of the Winter. The advent of circle hook use (mandatory in tournaments) in my opinion has helped spark the rebound of these amazing fish in south Florida. Boats caught as many as 36 sailfish in a single day during the Silver Sailfish Derby a live bait tournament and the top boat in the Pelican Yacht Club tournament caught an impressive 27 sailfish in 1 day. Unprecedented.
Fishing for these fish has remained consistent from early January through the last day of the Jupiter Billfish Tournament on Friday the 13th where live bait boats caught as many as 20 sailfish in a single day.
Best fishing the past couple of days has been 5 miles NE of the St. Lucie Inlet in 45-65ft of water fishing around large bait schools. As the most recent front pushes through look for fish to slide south and new fish to find the bait. Fishing should only get better for sailfish over the coming weeks.
Meat fishing (dolphin, tuna, kings, wahoo) has been a little slower than normal but it has been made up for by the arrival of massive schools of cobia. We caught 8 cobia the other day and saw as many as 50 in multiple schools. The fish we caught weighed up to 52lbs.
When weather is settled look for manta rays along edges offshore that will hold Cobia. Also look on the beaches during calm days or days with west wind for best results. Try casting crabs or Gulfstream Cobia slayer jigs (2oz. white, pink,)
Till next time tight lines and good luck
Stuart Fishing Forecast:
improved cobia fishing with each passing week. Great saifishing shall continue for the next couple of months. Better dolphin fishing should start to occur in the coming weeks
Target Species:
sailfish, cobia, dolphin, wahoo, grouper, amberjack
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