Ft. Myers - Offshore

Capt. Rick Featherstone
April 1, 2001
Fort Myers - Saltwater Fishing Report

Fishing Heats Up When Seas Are Down

Greetings;

Well fishing fans let me say this spring sure has been interesting out in the gulf. The good news is we caught our first tarpon of the year, we are catching some great permit, king mackerel, and lots of really nice trophy cudas, and sharks. The bad news is we had had to deal with several cancellations because of high wind and thunderstorm activity. The flip side to the wind has been some very good trout fishing in close.

Offshore the water temps have risen into the mid seventy's. Over the wrecks the jewfish have woke up and are eating everything they can. Permit have been active also. Our biggest so far this spring is a twenty six pounder. I had the pleasure of guiding Mina Hemingway, granddaughter of Earnest Hemingway. Her husband John hooked and landed the twenty six pound fish on ten pound tackle. I have been able to get several king mackerel over live bottom and ledges. No huge ones but respectable fish in the twenty pound range are in good numbers. If you like sore muscles just drop a blue runner or jack down on any of the wrecks. It will not be long before you feel the power of a jewfish testing your tackle. The cudas have been very active. We have released several over fifteen and a few over twenty pounds caught on light tackle. We had a blast on a couple of trips for tarpon / shark. I love it when the first bait of the morning hits the water and the line comes tight with a sixty pound blacktip shark streaking out drag! The action has been nonstop. We have released some very large bull sharks too. One over three hundred pounds. It was on one of these trips we caught and released our first tarpon of the year. A beautiful eighty pound fish. At one point it looked like a shark exibit with ten or more doasal fins tracking above the surface.

When the wind was just too strong to head out we had two pretty active inshore trips. It took some searching around but we managed limits of trout, lots of ladyfish, bonnet head sharks, jacks, spanish mackerel, and whiting. Of course we had the mandatory one that got away (three times). Big snook that came to play, but busted us off quickly.

Sincerely,

Capt. Rick Featherstone

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