January 14-20th

The fishing in Southwest Florida has brought a good consistent bite so far this year. My fishing charters have gotten to enjoy a wide variety of fish including triple tail, snapper, sheepshead, redfish, jack crevalle, and snook. A lot of which have been going home with clients for dinner. The water is gorgeous and the weather has been good to us with chilly mornings and warm afternoons.

At the end of the week I was able to make it offshore fishing on an overnight commercial fishing trip with a friend of mine. We hit the weather window just right. It was the day before a cold front blew in so we were able to get off the water before the wind picked up, take advantage of the pre front bite, and take advantage of an almost full moon. We started at 3AM Friday morning loading the boat with supplies and ice, then heading to the ramp. We splashed the boat around 430am and headed west, quickly getting offshore and to a ledge in about 90′ of water before sunrise.

We caught plenty of porgies and blue runners off the bottom, the blue runners were brought up and put on the big rod to be sent right back down. The amberjack bite started strong catching three back to back. Once that slowed down it was time to get in the water, another 12 amberjack were speared in short order. This was repeated at another spot, and then it was time to push further offshore and anchor for the night. As the breeze died down and the water slicked out, we set up over structure in 120′ of water for the night.

As soon as the sun was down the bite turned on. Every drop we were getting bites as soon as the bait hit the bottom. We caught one snapper after the next until around 1AM. We then called it a night and laid down on the bean bag chairs for a few hours. At 530Am the breeze picked up and started rocking the boat pretty good, so it was time to pull the anchor and move again. We headed back in to around 90′ again and caught 8 more amber jack, cleaned all of the fish, and then made the run in before the wind got any worse. It was a great, long day, but came home with almost a ton of meat to sell to the distributor.