Fishing Report

Kitefishing in the springtime can be the most exciting offshore fishing you will ever sea in the Florida Keys. The water tempature rises, the predominant easterly winds prevail, and the gulfstream current pushes in closer to the reef making it the perfect storm of conditions. Most of the Pelagic fish (i.e. Sailfish, Tuna, Dolphin, and Marlin) are in full migration mode migrating right through the Florida Keys. This is the best time of year to put the kites up off of Key Largo. Kitefishing with live baits is the most effective method of fishing for Sailfish,Marlin,Tuna and Dolphin. Kitefishing allows you to suspend your live bait on or near the surface and with the hook rigged in the back of the bait makes it swim in a natural method making it appear to be a natural free-swimming fish with all or most of the tackle hanging in the air. The bait of choice for kitefishing is the google-eye. We usually catch all of our bait at night and place them in storage pens at the dock. This  guarantees that we always have a fresh supply of live bait and that we don't have to spend time the day of the charter catching bait.

     The fishing last weekend was awesome as expected this time of year. We had a 15 knot east wind with plenty of current 6 miles off of north Key Largo. After deploying the sea-anchor in 150ft. of water, we set two kites up, one on each side. We rigged three live google-eyes on each side. I don't think we put all the baits out when we suddenly were covered up by Mahi-Mahi all around the boat eating anything we were throwing in the water. My anglers Brett and Jason caught 6 Mahi weighing up to 20 lbs. What an excellent start to the day. We were targeting Billfish that day, but were still pleased to hook and catch whatever decided to eat our live google-eyes. During the day Brett caught a few more Dolphin and a nice 15lb. Blackfin Tuna. Jason was busy doing battle with a big Kingfish when I looked over to the right baits and saw a Sailfish trying to eat the middle bait. I yelled at Brett to quickly drop back to the Sailfish so the fish could swallow the bait. Brett hooked the Sail and during the battle Jason landed his Kingfish. I told Jason to really pay attention at baits we still had out there. Sure enough Jason started screaming "There's another fish trying to eat my bait" I yelled back "drop,drop,drop!"Instantly we had a double header billfish. Jason's fish looked a little different than Brett's and when it was closer we noticed that it was a White Marlin. We ended catching and releasing both fish, a double-header Sailfish and Marlin at the same time. AWESOME!