Fort Lauderdale Fishing Report

The conditions early last week were out of the East at 15 mph, seas running 3-5 ft., water temperature 75 degrees here in sunny South Florida. Jim Rasko and Matt Hurt from Cincinnati Ohio. Down here on vacation enjoying the warm 75 degree Florida winter and looking to head offshore to target big game for Sailfish, Mahi and Kings.

We started off with two deep troll baits. The deep troll go down 35 to 55 feet of water. Deep baits are targeting Wahoo, King Mackerel, Bonito and Barracuda. The baits we use on the deep troll are blue and pink sea witch with a 8” strip of bait. The second bait is a 3 ½” Drone spoon. On the surface we fish 4 baits. Two Ballyhoos on the long riggers that are rigged naked “with no skirts or plugs in front of the Ballyhoo”. The short riggers have strip baits with skirts. We fish in 100’ of water out to 175’ of water working the reefs, picking away at King Fish and Bonito, after targeting fish on the reef, it was now time to do some live baiting with kites for Sailfish. Today there was little to slight current, so I went to our artificial wreck, which is a freighter that was sunk back in 1982. We put a live Goggle Eye down at the bottom with 3 pound lead, the live bait is good to catch Grouper, Snapper or Amberjack. Also we put two kites up in the air targeting Sailfish.

Our first fish was a Mahi Mahi that ate the live Goggle Eye from the left short kite, and Jim reeled him in - this will be their dinner for tonight. While sitting there waiting for bottom rod to bend over, a black shadow appeared on the right short. This Sailfish was very aggressive, grabbing the live bait, screaming off line immediately and tail walking out of the water, making a spectacular show. Matt fought the Sailfish for 30 minutes, tough fish as the Sail gave a heck of a battle. Matt continued to gain line and got the Sail closer to the boat. Our mate David Jackson reached down and grabbed the Sailfish by the bill, pulled the fish in the boat unharmed, then we released the fish and returned him to live for another day.

This ends another successful and adventurous deep sea fishing charter on the Happy Day Today with the Topshotfishing team and Captain Zsak - 954-439-8106 – www.topshotfishing.com