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Fort Lauderdale Fishing Happy Day Today
Capt. David Zsak
December 13, 2012
Fort Lauderdale - Saltwater Fishing Report
Earlier this week George and his son Anthony chartered the "Happy Day Today" for an all day offshore charter. A good day fishing for the father son team as we ended up with 10 Mahi and one wee Wahoo. Also we did let a couple Mahi go due to smaller size fish.
The conditions for fishing in Fort Lauderdale were good for the Mahi bite due to the wind, however it was a bit choppy, the seas were 3' to 4', yet still made for a nice day on the water. We had a consistent Easterly wind for previous 5 days. The wind blowing typically pushes any floating debris closer to shore and with current makes for a good rip current. We left the dock around 7:30 and started fishing offshore of Fort Lauderdale around 8:15am in 200 feet of water. The trolling speed was 6 to 7 knots and we fished a spread of 6 lines. One deep line which was a Wahoo rig, a jet head skirted with a bonito strip. The 5 surface lines were Ballyhoos, one shotgun long, left and right long and left and right short rigger lines.
The first two Mahi we caught were in 250' of water. Both fish ranged in the 8 to 10 pound range. After working the area for another 30 to 45 minutes, we continued to fish and head offshore in search of the rip current and weed lines. We trolled out to 650' of water and that is where we located a good area to fish. The birds were diving, floating debris, a pallet, a well organized weed line and soon as we got to the area we had an instant Mahi double header. After catching those two fish, we continued to work the area especially where the pallet was floating. We ended up catching a small Wahoo, over 10 Mahi, we let 2 go that were barely legal, no need to keep a Mahi that is less than 23" when we had a nice box of fish. George and his son Anthony did a great job angling the Mahi. After fishing offshore in 650 to 700' of water for more than half the trip, we decided to head inshore and try for a Sailfish for the George and Anthony.
We trolled inshore to see if we could find any more floating pallets and when we reached 400' of water with no more bites, we ran into shallower water and set up on top of a wreck located in North Fort Lauderdale in an area called the Steeple. We had a dozen live Goggeleyes in the bait well. We fished two kites, which is two baits per kite along with two rigger lines with live Gogs. We used leads to get the baits down in the water column and we all awaiting a Sail bite.
We had around two hours left in the charter and gave a strong effort to getting a Sail on the line for Anthony, however we never did have a shot at catching a Sailfish. In the two hours of Sailfishing, we did have three nice bites from King Mackerel, all the three fish were sizeable Kings (15 to 18 pound fish), but all three Kings "sky rocketed" the Gogs and we did not hook them. Sky Rocketing is when a King Mackerel is trying to eat the bait and jumps 5' or more out of the water, they either eat, chop and ultimately miss the bait in the air and did not get hooked. After the two hours of fishing in Fort Lauderdale, it was time to head back to the dock. Thanks again to George and Anthony as we had a good time fishing and we hope to have you back again in the near future.
If interested in fishing charter aboard the "Happy Day Today" located at the Bahia Mar Charter Dock at 801 Sea Breeze Blvd., Fort Lauderdale, FL 33316. Please give us a call or email to further discuss the bite, reservations or anything else you would like to discuss with the captain.
Regards, Captain Zsak 954-309-7457
Target Species:
Mahi Mahi
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