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+--- Thread: Dolphin and Mutton Snapper (/showthread.php?tid=216230)
Dolphin and Mutton Snapper - KnotNancy - 08-19-2005
With the most recent hike in gas prices, the question that must be answered by the dolphin fisherman is "Is it worth the expense of fuel to go out and search for dolphin?" Only you can answer that question. On two of my last three trips offshore the answer for me is YES it has been worth it. The third trip left us disappointed and we saved the day in on the reef bottom fishing.
On the reef, there was one day when there was a flurry of sailfish. Live baiting for kingfish has been OK one day and not so good on others. Those pulling spoons on planers have faired much better as you'll need to cover a lot of ground to find the fish off our area this time of year. Mixed in with the kings have been some bonito, barracuda, and an occasional blackfin tuna. If you like bottom fishing, the mutton snapper have been cooperating.
Sunday (8/14) afternoon, Mike and Jane Johnson wanted to beat the heat some and to catch some fish. We left the dock at Spinnaker Marina at 4:00 PM with some dolphin action in mind. At 4.7 miles out the birds put us on a large floating wooden crate that was loaded with bar jack. After catching about a half dozen fish a piece, we continued on. At 10 miles, two birds put us on the dolphin. The first three fish we caught were pushing 10 pounds each and the fourth fish was about 6 pounds. These were the first dolphin that either Mike or Jane had caught and they were amazed at the beautiful colors and how the fish jumped. We had plenty of fish in the box and the decision was made to release any other dolphin we might catch. Running south, we found the birds again and this time they were over large blue runners. Next we found a large plastic garbage bin and caught more bar jacks with jigs. The action was fast and furious. The next set of birds put us on more dolphin and blue runners. With all the action, both anglers were all
s. We ran back in and made a stop for barracuda using the blue runners as bait. We got one hit and the cuda got a half meal as it chopped the runner in half right behind the trailer hook.Tuesday (8/16) afternoon, Mike and Jane were back for a second afternoon of fishing. Our game plan was the same as on Sunday. At 12 miles, I found a barnacle encrusted piece of styrofoam that produced 3 dolphin (2 on jigs and 1 on live bait) that were all released. After that it took a lot of searching, however, we finally found the birds and started catching blue runners. We also found 2 rainbow runners mixed in with the blue runners. Once again, they were all
s at catching fish, having fun, and enjoying the beautiful weather. We ended the evening trying for a sailfish. We had time enough for two drifts and despite some heavy chumming, we didn't get any strikes or even have a bait get nervous.Thursday (8/18), Oscar Marrero and Ray Cruz had two goals in mind. The first was to catch a few dolphin and the second was to end the day doing some bottom fishing around the wrecks. Today was the day when dolphin fishing was to be disappointing. We ran out as far as 25 miles and only found 1 styrofoam ball and 1 coconut. Every bird we found was flying back inshore. Once we got beyond 5 miles, the weed disappeared except for some very scattered lines that were about 100 yards long. We worked the lines and any scattered grass areas we found with no results. Goal one was a disappointment, so we moved on to wreck fishing. It started slow and when I threatened to move, we caught our first mutton snapper. Then several sharks moved in and we landed and released 1 of 3 fish (mono leaders) that we hooked up. At the second wreck, I didn't like our position as there wasn't as much current in shallower. After resetting the anchor, we caught our second mutton and lost a barracuda (mono leader again) to a cut off. That's how the 3/4 day ended and goal two was accomplished.
Captain Dave Kostyo
Knot Nancy Fishing Charters
305 620-5896 Charter
305 965-9454 Cell
www.knotnancy.com
nkostyo@bellsouth.net
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