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Fort Lauderdale
Capt. Mike Johnson
February 3, 2007
Fort Lauderdale - Saltwater Fishing Report
November brought early harsh cold fronts (for us) off the Florida coast. Along with the cold fronts came hoards of baitfish. As we all know, where there is baitfish there are gamefish. Schools of sardines could be found from the reef out to three to four hundred feet of water. If you mark the bait on your screen, stay on it! Pay offs came in the form of larger mahi mahi, bonita and most sought after, the sailfish. Shoals of ballyhoos were on the inside patch reefs, where we anchor, chum and net them. Pulling spreads of live ballyhoos along with a live hoo daisy chain brought excellent results with the mahi and the sails. Keep an eye on your spread, when your ballyhoos start jumping and skittering out of the water danger and excitement is near. One great advantage to pulling the live ballyhoos, is the ability to cover lots of ground. Early in the season the sailfish are not always concentrated in one depth like later in winter. So covering more ground anywhere from 80-100 feet out to say 400 feet may or does produce better results .On the troll the kingfish have slowed down a bit, but with the mahi and sails around why bother!
In December, the cold fronts were much less severe and the baitfish seemed to have thinned. Catching the prized ballyhoos for bait was difficult to say the least. One day they were there, the next, they were not. Luckily, we always have the hardy goggle eye to suspend from the kite. As long as there was north wind and a nip in the air the fish were there. Wahoo have been making a strong showing in the last week or so. Not the monsters that we see in late summer but more of them. Fish in the 15 to 30 pound range fell victim to strip baits, spoons and double hooked ballyhoos. For better results we bump our trolling speed up a couple of knots. Don't worry you cannot out troll a wahoo, if you pull it they will catch it. It's What They Do.
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