Charter Fishing Fun Fort Lauderdale
Capt. John Logan
December 10, 2012
Fort Lauderdale - Saltwater Fishing Report
Today fun was had charter fishing in Fort Lauderdale and it wasn't just the guests that had the fun… The crew had fun too.
While fishing was what I would consider slow, our two guests, Tom and Jim enjoyed the day immensely. It started slow, we had bouts with fish in groups and we ended with a bang, my favorite way to end a day.
Tom has fished with us before a few times. He always brings new people and had caught a Swordfish on an evening trip with us. Well, he didn't catch the Sword, one of his guests did.
And… He caught Mahi's, Bonito (lots of them from what he said) and a Sail on a previous trip with captain Rick. Well, Tom didn't actually catch the Sailfish, one of his guests did.
So today when I mentioned live bait to try for a Sail? Him agreed whole heatedly. And we began trolling.
Our first hour of fishing produced nothing. We ventured off shore a ways hoping to find some weed or a current edge but nothing was in sight and we headed back into the reef area. We managed a couple of Mahi-mahi and a Bonito. Tom had specifically asked NOT to catch Bonito; he had his fill of them last trip. Sorry Tom, they haven't been here much in weeks.
Some more trolling and we found a few Kingfish, a rare catch of late. They haven't been biting well. Oh, and we caught another Bonito.
Enough trolling, let's get out the livies and put the kites up. Our first visitor? A small Silky shark. So small, all he could manage was to clip the tail of one of the baits and kill it. But live bait has been the ticket as of late and within just 30 minutes or so, we added 3 more Mahi's to the box, as well as a nice sized Ciro Mackerel. But alas, no Sailfish appeared for us as we tried everything, moving depth, changing baits and so on. We just couldn't raise one to get the bite and time was running out.
I did say we ended with a bang, right? Being so far from the port, we decided to troll back and it wasn't long before we had a multiple hit area. First, a Sailfish came in on one of our rigger baits. Then 2 rigger baits came down both with fish on them. Go ahead, guess what they were? Bonitos. Then one deep line rang out and we were cut off, then the other deep line went down and we missed that hit completely. While ALL this pandemonium was going on, that pesky Sailfish was still trying to eat that rigger bait.
Andrew was quick with a pitched live bait and once it was in position, the Sail bit and the game was on. But Tom was occupied with whatever was on his rod so Jim got the call.
Tom's fish escaped before being boated but Jim did an excellent job on the spinner reeling in his first Sailfish!
While the boys were delighted with what we had caught even before the Sailfish bit, that made the day. It wasn't until we got back to the dock that I found Tom had yet to catch one.
He'll be back to fish with us again and this time, I'll make sure his charter fishing fun in Fort Lauderdale includes that Sailfish.
Capt. Steve Souther
Fort Lauderdale Off Shore Fishing
www.all-inclusivesportfishing.com
(954) 761-8202
Target Species:
Sailfish, Shark, Dolphin, Wahoo, Tuna, Marlin, Swordfish and more...
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