Vertical Jigging with Right Hook Charters 6-21-2013

June 24, 2013 by cudamanadventures

THE FISHING TRIP:
Aboard the “Right Hook ” with Captain Mike

The Spot : Riviera beach Wrecks

Weather : Partly Cloudy with Chances of Rain but the rain was not close to us.

Water: 3 foot seas

Fish catches: Amber jacks, African Pompano, Almaco Jacks, Horse eye Jacks, and a black fin tuna

Biggest size Type : 25 pound Black Fin tuna

Techniques : Vertical Jigging

Jigs : 130-350 grams, butterfly jigs, speed jigs, Pink, red/Glow, silver, and blue worked the most.

This trip had been a month in the making, Jeff (Angryangler from 360Tuna.com) had been trying to get a group of jiggers to charter a boat he fished in previously, but wanted to get people that only jigged. This jigging trip was aimed at catching and releasing Sea Donkeys (over 40 pound Amberjacks). No bait was to be used on this trip. It was first to set sail on June 9th but the boat’s GPS unit fried and since the captain did not want to just take our money he advised us to wait until he got familiar with his new unit. After a couple of weeks Jeff had the idea to do a mini swap-shop on vertical jigging items. Here in South Florida we lack stores that have dedicated Vertical Jigging Products and usually only sell knock offs or products that might work but are not proven. I thought the swap-shop flea market was a great idea so I took some of the jigs I did not use so much, you never know what does not work for me might be a gold mine for someone else. Jeff put out a showcase of the the items he brought and was kind enough to offer free t-shirts and jigs. Hope the idea keeps going in the future. Two friends of our regular fishing crew were going to go on the first scheduled trip that was canceled, then it was only Ricky but the guys forgot all about him and since I didn’t check the thread on that forum Ricky was left out. Sorry my friend this was my fault. Well Ricky went on another Jigging trip with the Sealegs III out of Hollywood.

African Pompano and Yellow Tail Snappers on Right Hook Charter. Trip before us

The Captain arrived and we loaded our gear in the boat. The boat was a very nice looking boat, tons of space for 6 people fishing. Enough space to cast out lures and jig comfortably. There weren’t many tangles and all were savvy as to what to do when hooking up a fish. A few fish were lost to knot problems and a couple of jigs were lost. I lost one jig because I did not replace my old split ring which was a bit partially open and as I jigged it may have just opened and allowed the jig fall off. I have seen this a few times already. Next time I will just get rid of the old ring and will replace it with a new one. Some other fish were lost because of knot failure. I helped one of the boys by tying a PR knot which was and adventure on it’s own trying to do it with the boat moving, no glasses on, and hurrying up to get ready to drop my jigs, LOL. The know was done but no big fish to test if would hold up since I only had time to do 3 over under half hitches and one six turn reverse hitch. I usually do about 6 over under half hitches then a three turn hitch, and finish with a six turn hitch and burn the end with a cigarette lighter wich was not done this time.

The Vertical Jigging got going and a couple that drove from Georgia were hooking up pretty well with inchiku type jigs in combination with small plastic squid skirts about a foot about the jigs. They got a small african pompano, a horse eye jack, and a small AJ on those jigs.

The day went on and we were a bit worried that it would be a skunked out trip but after the first few fish we went into deeper water and had double and quad hookups at a time, all were small amber jacks and then an almaco jack came on board. One of the last fish of the night was a nice surprise as the captain said we might get some blackfins in this area and so Garriga’s fish ended up being a nice 25 pound Blackfin Tuna. Congratulations to all since we did not skunk out.

To finish this Vertical Jigging report here are some more pictures. Just hoover over the pics with your mouse pointer to get a description.

Jigging Trip June 15th on the Reward Won

June 18, 2013 by cudamanadventures

THE FISHING TRIP: Saturday June 15th 2013
Aboard the “ Reward Won ” with Captain Wayne

Leaving Bayside Marina

The Spot : Fished from Miami to Fowey Rocks light

Weather : Sunny, calm winds

Water: Calm

Fish catches: Black fin tunas, Bonitos, Almaco Jacks, red Groupers

Biggest size Type : All small fish, bonitos up to 15 pounds

Techniques : 99% Vertical Jigging, 1% cut bait

Jigs : 100-230 gram, butterfly jigs, speed jigs, silver, and blue worked the most for me.

What can I say, I was glad to get back in the water. During my last fishing trip one of my jigging rods broke because I was bored and wanted to catch a big fish. I was left with a bitter taste in my luck. Luck has not changed much lately. On this trip all looked perfect. The weather looked great, the rains had stopped, the seas were calm, and the current was good. The fish bite was not there. The bottom machine was marking nice fish on just about every stop. The fish were not cooperating on the first few drops. During the morning only a small blackfin tuna was caught, we encountered some weed lines and a big balloon floating but no fish under. Later in the afternoon it started to get better with a few bonitos and some almaco jacks coming overboard. All but two bonitos were released. Only 3 people gave up on the jigging and started using bait. A few small red groupers were landed and released. All in all it felt good to be out there again. Hopefully next time it will get better.

The other boat on the Reward Fleet did pretty good at night catching a few dozen yellow tails.

Bait Trip on Out of Control IV June 1st 2013

June 1, 2013 by cudamanadventures

THE FISHING TRIP: Saturday June 1st 2013
Aboard the “Out of Control IV” with Captain Ralph

The Spot : Fished from Port Everglades to Hollywood Beach area

Weather : Rainy, Very Cloudy

Water: 2 to 4 foot seas with a few bigger swells in between

Fish catches: yellow tail snappers, small throw back mutton snappers, blue runners, a lion fish

Biggest size Type : Dusky Shark over 100 pounds

Techniques : Vertical Jigging, cut bait, and live bait

Jigs : 250 gram glow jig

Other terminal tackle used: 1/8 oz Jig heads for bait strips, 1/2 ounce weights knocker rig style for bottom fishing

This trip was another one for the books. After getting my jigging trip to West Palm Beach canceled because the Charter Boat’s bottom machine burnt out we all scattered looking for a make up trip. So we got a nice deal on the Out Of Control party fishing boat. It was yet another slow trip. We began with the cutting of the bait and since this was going to be a yellow tail and small snapper catching trip I brought some king fish bellies to at least bring one fish home for dinner. I was not expecting much from this trip since all other party boats were reporting slow fishing as well during that weekend. It was a rainy day and there was no current at all. Conditions were again a plague for good fishing. On the first few stops some yellow tails were caught, a nice lionfish came overboard by Ricky and all hell broke loose as soon as the bite got better then the sharks showed up. Small muttons, a couple we keepers and some nice mangroves were caught, the biggest mangrove caught by Adam was bit in half by a shark. I was catching some blue runners and was using them for bait. I caught a nice yellow tail that later on was dinner for two at home. SO! I got bored and decided to put on a show I later came to regret. I took my jigging rod and decided to go after the sharks, well I hooked one up and the battle was on. The shark fought nice, at the beggining for a minute I tough it maybe a grouper, nice runs no head shakes. I reeled in then it would run again and again. I was sweating up a storm when on one of the runs PAW! an explosion MY ROD BROKE! Not what I expected a $300 fishing rod would do. I had caught fish over 50 pounds on it before but I guess it just couldn’t take a mad over 100 pound shark. Well I tdecided to finish the battle get the shark closer and recover the piece of rod I lost. Got the shark boat side took some pics but the line busted making me loose the rod piece. HOT DANG IT!!! I will not do that again! Next time I will not drop unless I have a shark rod.

For a description of the pictures just place your mouse pointer over them.

Ron the photographer on this trip. Thanks for the pics bro

36 Hour Fishing Trip from Fort Lauderdale to Key Largo and Back May 4th to May 5th

May 9, 2013 by cudamanadventures

THE FISHING TRIP: 36 Hour Fishing Trip from Fort Lauderdale to Key Largo and Back May 4^th to May 5^th2013

This Cobia was caught on a vertical jig

Aboard the “Out Of Control IV” with Captain Ralph and Captain Dennis

The Spot : From Port Ever Glades to Key Largo Soldier Key

Weather : Partly Sunny then clear skies

Water: Calm with strong over 3 knot currents at first then cloudy with sand mix noticeable and 2 knot currents

Fish catches (from all in boat): cobia, amber jacks, mutton snapper, yellow tails, black groupers, gag groupers, and king fish

Biggest size Type : Amber jack

Techniques : Vertical Jigging, cut bait, and live bait

Jigs : 100-250 gram, Bullet type bucktail jigs, butterfly jigs, speed jigs, Pink, red/white, silver, and blue worked the most.

The luck still ok, but can get better

A new boat is in town out of Fort Lauderdale and it’s going to be doing long range trips to the Florida Keys and the Bahamas. The out Of Control fleet just expanded with a 75 ft boat and a beam of 21 ft powered by two JohnDeer engines with over 500 hp each and can do 18 knot service speed and capabilities of over 22 knots. I am glad I was able to witness the power of these engines as later on you will read.

Prior to the day of fishing Nilson a friend of a few fishing years and I went on a bait hunting expedition for a couple of hours. We got 21 large size pinfish and kept them alive in a 15 gallon bucket with an aerator and a bit of aquarium ammonia neutralizer, a bottle of frozen water helped to cool down the water and keep the fish calm. One of them did not make the 1.5 hour journey to the docks, but that was expected.

On the day of fishing, we made it to the boat a couple of hours prior departure to find out that the crew already had a bait well with a decent amount of bait (blue runners and spot grunts). We loaded our gear and around 4:20 or so we were well on the way. By sunrise we were in the Miami Port Everglades Channel marker area catching more bait. A chum bucket was deployed and we loaded with 40 or more pins, 30 or so spot grunts and some blue runners. The boat had tinker mackerels, squid, frozen ballyhoo, and about 20 or so bonitos caught the day before. We had all the bait we needed for the trip.

Saturday started with slow fishing around Fowey Rocks lighthouse, and can we say “slow” a few small fish here and there. We had all the live bait and other good baits but we couldn’t quiet get the bait where we needed it, on the bottom. The current was ripping in over 200 feet so we moved shallower. A few fish came up among them a nice gag caught by Robert another fishing friend of mines and I got a mutton snapper as the night fall came.

The flying fish were all over the boat but were running a bit deep as they got close by. I waited patiently until I saw one that bluntly committed suicide by flying into the boat through a small gap and hitting the live well. I ran like a running back going for a Hail Mary 3 seconds left on the 4^th quarter. I got the sucker and saved it for later. Well, it didn’t work out so well for me as I got a big shark instead of the mutton or grouper I was looking for. Later on the boat crew brought out a net and I was able to get 4 more flying fish with it. Got wet like I was under the rain and it didn’t pay off since we could not find a spot with slower currents. A baby African pompano came up on a flyer by Nilson. The plan was to make it to Isla Morada but given the conditions with stronger winds than expected and strong currents needing 16 ounces to bring the weights to the bottom, the captain decided it was better to turn around and find better spots closer to Miami. A few fish did come up, some yellow tails, some groupers, and some jacks.

On Sunday morning we found some wrecks that were holding fish. I lost my attempt at a large amber jack when my line was tangled by someone’s braid line and when they where told not to pull they did the opposite so I lost the fish. You just got to love when that happens. On the way back we hit many wrecks and the captain cranked that engine to make a speed wreck fishing race to the finish line. By Haulover we found a wreck that was holding nice amounts of vermillion snappers (beeliners). That saved the trip for some. Once again the captain cranked the engines even faster and mover over the county line where the fun began. I started as I did on some of the stops with vertical fishing. I was fishing a long 300 gram jig when a 35” cobia hit it. I got it to the boat and off to the cooler it went. That was one of three cobias caught that day. Right after that a nice 31 pound AJ was caught by my friend Ricky another friend of a few fishing years caught it vertical jigging a long jig as well. We all got into the jigging loosing some massive hits to the wreck. I had my reel drag maxed but it just ran like butter as if it was greased so I lost that fish.

Another picture of the cobia caught on a vertical jig slow mechanical technique

In the end the crew and the friends is what made the slow fishing conditions fun and interesting, while in the other hand we had that one guys whom is always complaining of not catching fish but sleeping most of the time while others are catching bait or fishing. I ended with an over 15 pound king fish, the mutton snapper that won the biggest snapper pool, the cobia, and some vermilion snappers. It could have been much much better, but the weather did not get our memo. There is always that next time if it isn’t, I will hear “you should have been here yesterday”. So I have to keep on fishing to be there that one day when all hell breaks loose and fish are eating everything you throw at them including the bottom of the boat.

Rob and his Gag Grouper

Ricky and his AJ

Nilson and his African Pompano (released back into the water)

The Catch from the 2 days, looks very small for 14 people but given the conditions it was great.

Until next time

Yankee Capts April 13th to 14th 2 day trip, my first trip of the year in 2013

April 14, 2013 by cudamanadventures

THE FISHING TRIP:
Aboard the “Yankee Capts” with Captain Greg

The Spot : Dry Tortugas

Weather : Weak cool north breeze

Water: Sometimes clear and sometimes with that nice sandy mix

Fish catches: Mutton Snapper, Yellow Tail Snappers, Cobia, King Fish, Amber Jack, Porgie, Bonitos

Biggest size Type : 30.8 pound Kingfish, 25.4 pound cobia, and 25 pound Amber Jack

Techniques : Vertical Jigging, cut bait, and live bait

Jigs : 100-250 gram, butterfly jigs, speed jigs, silver, green, and blue colors worked the most.

We left to start fishing on the 13th and someone brought bananas on the boat! It was very, very slow, but had great fun as always

I missed two trips this year because of work keeping me at a standstill on life. so It’s been several months since my last report and was hoping for it to be a good one but as sometimes happens not always do we get a limit or half a limit on a Dry Tortugas trip. We had a bit of a heat wave, a weak cool north breeze with no hot bites in between. The water looked nice, sometimes clear and sometimes with that nice sandy mixed color I like. As usual the Yankee Capts crew did everything they could to get the fishing going. We fished in 110’ to 120’s and when the wind calmed down we fished 190 ‘ then 220 to 245. After the wind came back we went to 90’ and then back up to 180’. At times there was no time wasted, if only sharks bit and nothing worth it came up, they moved the boat in hopes for the fish to bite. It was nice to get the opportunity to fish in those depths and with barely any current I deployed large baits for groupers (whole Spanish macks, speedos, and other freshly caught baits, butterflied or chucked), no groupers, only sharks were the takers. On a couple of stops I was even able to get a 1.5 ounce knocker rig down to 240’ using 17 pound test line and a strip of kingfish and again with a baby flyer caught in the early am before the sun came up. Only a nice yellow tail came from that. The vertical jigging only produced 2 small kingfish, a bonito, and a baby red grouper. I threw so many different jigs and every color and size I had in my bag of tricks but still wasn’t enough to get the bite going. I had macks and goggle eyes caught in the a.m. but those were no help. The combos and crabs did not work the kingfish, bonito, and blue runners I got while jigging got me a porgie and some yellow tails.

Saturday morning came in with a tail bite that did not last long and a small school of Mahis that I missed as they were all over the stern but not near the bow. I was stubborn and fished only the bow. I should have moved around since the boat was not even half full. I paid the price. In the afternoon all I got was an AJ with a butterflied goggle eye. On Saturday night I was running low on fresh bait so I put a chunk of a flyer and asked Rodney the rod holder for some help while I tried to get some more flying fish with the net. Irish man screamed “YOUR ROD!” I handed him my net to retrieve and started fighting the shark that turned into a cobia. The new mate got it on the head with one shot and as Chad was taking it to the box we decided to weigh it so I took my scale and put it on Chads fish hook, it showed 24 pounds and slipped out sending Chad’s fish hook flying towards his family jewls. Somehow he managed to hurt and laugh at the same time, sorry mate! Later that night while listening to Cameron’s, Chad’s, and the Captain’s jokes I asked Rodney to do me a favor again and told the guys I was going to sit down and watch Rodney getting me a mutton. I was joking around and bam! I did get a mutton, the only one I was to get for the rest of the trip.

As Sunday morning came it got a bit boring as the bite was not really there again. No hits on the big baits barely any on the small baits so I decided to give it a try and get a kingfish and others were trying it as well. I saw a pod of bonitos jump through the air like sardines and so I retrieved my rig and tossed it back out almost in front of it hoping for a nice fish other than bonitos to hit it and very quickly the drag started singing zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz together with the bad bearing in my very well used spinning reel rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr, zzrzzrzzrzrrzrrzrrzrrzrzzrzzrzz, you get the point on the sound LOL. Well from the bow to the stern, two sweat drops down my head and zig sagging over, under, around all the way to the other side and everyone politely moving and helping by getting out the way then it was Chad on one end and Lyndon on the other making sure the fish hit the deck and so it did. Fish in the box pool money in the works. I tossed another horse size fresh ballyhoo out and just waited sweating for that last call from the captain and all lines out. This wouldn’t have been the first time someone won the pool money 5 minutes from the end of the trip.

A father and son (I think they were) had a combined 6 muttons next to the stern. It was the son’s first time fishing and gets about 3 of those muttons and one of them was about 15 pounds. At the end my take home final tally was a 30.8 pound king fish (the pool winner), a 25.4 pound cobia, a 25 pound AJ, one 10 pound mutton (the biologist did the weigh in), a nice porgie, and some yellow tails.

It was great to see some familiar faces as always. Cameron, hope you have a nice voyage back to Canada man, it was nice to fish with you again, see you next year man. Cameron is a friend I met a few years ago on the Yankee Capts fishing Headboat out of Watson Island in the Florida Keys.

I forgot my camera and had my gopro pointing to the skies so here are the only pictures I got. Thanks crew members for taking them.

DRY TORTUGAS OCTOBER 18th TO OCTOBER 21st 2012

October 21, 2012 by cudamanadventures

We went fishing with Captain Yuri once more. Here is part of the report and story as I remember it.

THE FISHING TRIP: OCTOBER 18th OCTOBER 21st 2012
Aboard the “Lauren Jeanne” with Captain Yuri Vakselis

The Spot : Dry Tortugas, Florida

Weather : cloudy, winds of 10 to 15 knots? first 3 days up top 20 knots on the last day

Water: Calm at first then cloudy with sand mix noticeable

Fish catches: Mutton Snappers, Yellow Tail, Snappers, Mangrove Snappers, lane snappers, many kinds of Groupers, King Mackerels (kingfish), Cero Mackerel, and football sized Blue Runners

Biggest size Type : Muttons 15lbs … Yellow Tail snapper 4 lbs, Mangrove snapper 6 lbs, Red Grouper around 16 lbs…Kingfish mackerel around 20lbs

Techniques : Vertical Jigging, cut bait, and live bait

Jigs : 100-250 gram, Bullet type bucktail jigs, butterknife jigs, butterfly jigs, speed jigs, Pink, red/white, silver, and blue worked the most.

THE GAME PLAN: It was going to be a mixed jigging trip and bait trip. We had planned what worked for us last year, no bait in the water until we finished jigging. It worked at the beginning but later on we seemed to have gone in our own individual plans to get the fish to bite. We all had mixed jigging and baits at the same time and it worked ok. Jigging didn’t impair fishing with bait and fishing with bait didn’t impair jigging. Dead bait worked better by switching to different baits as often as the bite slowed down.

THE BAIT: It was known that it is imperative that we take all kinds of oily baits to the Dry Tortugas but it was pretty hard to gather bait before the trip,yes, again just like last year. Because of our schedules it was hard to get out on the days that the conditions would dictate good bait catching for us and this year we were also plagued by the canal water to close to the bait catching areas and lets not talk about the gas prices to get to the bait catching areas. We collected a few runners, macks, and jacks. We decided to stop trying and to catch bait on the day of the trip. On the way up some stopped by Atlantic fisheries and got some fresh ballyhoos and frozen gogs. Nilson and I stopped at the bridges for some threadfins (in case we went to a wreck), and mackerels. On one of the bridges we saw Adel and his frien catching some threadfins, he is one of the people that fish the Yankee Capts regularly. Talked to him for a bit, he gave me a new bait contact, and I wished him good luck on the trip. We the n passed by the bridges after 7 mile bridge and found a few barjacks and yellow jacks. Some of our crew went to get some pins and pins they got, great job guys. Wish you would have waited for me so we could have kept a few more alive.

BASICS WERE LOADED: . After the bait we stopped at one of my favorite Pizza Places, the one across from Winn-Dixie in No Name Key, Pizza Works. What great Pizza, or is it that I am always very hungry by the time I get there? Only thing is that every year it just keeps on getting smaller. After pizza it was a Cannon Ball Race for the best bunks. Low Rider Red car team pulled a David Copperfield/David Blain act on us and disappeared so it was to safely race to the docks. Team Stoner a little confused made a turn back to No Name Key, which gave us the advantage to at least get the small bunks even though we missed Schrimp Road we got there before them. We loaded the boat and enjoyed a few beers.

THURSDAY FISHING STARTED: We left the docks around 8:10 pm and started fishing shortly after midnight. We knew that we were going to be plagued with high currents but surprisingly the Captain found areas in 130 to 150 were we could fish with 6 to 8 ounces of weight, but we celebrated too early as every time the tide changed we would need up to 2 pounds to find bottom. On my snapper rod I never went above 10 ounces but I was using light line. On my grouper rod I was using 12 ounces. For snapper I started with 40 lb test leader but after loosing the first fish I stuck with 60lb leader most of the time and when the bite slowed down or the fish got bigger and the sun was out I switched to 50 pound fluorocarbon and at times switching back to 40 pound leader. After the water was chummed up the muttons started chewing within an hour of us being there. The bite started slow from the get go and we prepared for an ok trip. It was slow pickings but we got a good job done, at least I think. On the first night we got some muffin muttons while a few sharks came by and collected their Tortugas tax.

FRIDAY CAME: This is when the jigging really got pretty good. There were some small groupers, muttons, and Red American snappers caught. The days that followed a few more came up by way of jigging. FISHING ALMOST ENDED: Well, we were getting taxed heavily by the sharks. We lost just too many muttons to them and on one of those as I was getting ready to grab the leader on my line a stupid shark dashed to the bottom cut the line off and the 10 ounce weight sprung bat towards my head. I was not able to move away fast enough and up came the punch from Shark Tyson, well, knock down!!!! I hit the floor up I came bleeding like a boxer and went to get some paper towels, the Captain gave me something to clean it up and a band aid, so all in all was kewl with a bit of double vision and blurriness. We kept fishing and after the trips was over I ended up going to urgent care, I was sent to Bascom Palmer Eye Institute, some anesthetics and an eye patch until my laser procedure to remove some blood vessels. Just be car eful with handling those tiny sharks, sometime they cause the most damage. Pic don’t look so bad but it felt rally bad.

SATURDAY: This was a slow pickings day for most, the daytime brought some slob and we got to fish in 250 feet where some yellow eyes and more Red Americans kept on coming as pests. At night most of the time was filled with muffins, but we got a few nice ones as well.

SUNDAY FISHING ENDED: The captain said that the wind would pick up in the morning so we headed to fish by Rebecca’s Shoals. This is were the nice flag yellow tails came from. It got a little rough but not enough to get anyone sick. We did a couple of moves around the area and surprisingly were fishing in 30 feet of water were a couple of nice Red Groupers, more flag yellow tails, and some button muttons came up. This is where some were able to catch up in the fishing; it was not bad at all.

What bait worked best? As always the fresh bait is what did it; fresh gogs, fresh ballyhoo, fresh blue runners, fresh bonito, and fresh pinfish, some of the backup bait was used, but the men in the grey suit loved it too much. At least that was the case in my part.

THE FINAL TALLY WAS:

Herbert (cudaman):
20 muttons with biggest at 14.5 pounds, a 6 pound mangrove, 2 yellow eyes(only kept my 2 day snapper limit), 1 Red American snapper, 2 triggerfish, one strawberry grouper, one red grouper, a cero mackerel, a kingfish, and too many sharks to count with one that almost leaves me blind.

Nilson (rare):
15 muttons with biggest at 14 pounds, a 6 pounder mangrove, too many sharks to count, and a 20 pounder kingfish

Rory (PhishingPhanatic):
10 muttons with biggest around 14 pounds, 3 flags at around 24″ each, 1 red grouper, 1 king, 1 baby cobia, 1 big jack crevalle, and 323 sharks

Ricky (Rijkaard):
12 muttons with biggest mutton at 15 pounds, 3 mangrove snappers, 3 yellow tail snappers, 1 kingfish, 1 nice margate, 1 rockhind grouper, 1 red grouper, and too many sharks to count.

Robert (WhoDey):
11 muttons, 2 Mangroves, 2 Red American snappers, 4 yellowtails, and 3 red grouper, and too many sharks to count.

Adam (EnglishAdam):
15 mutton, one mangrove, 2 Red American snappers, and a red grouper, and too many sharks to count.

Here are the pics:

Picking up Nilson on my old faithfull 300k plus miles truck