Northwest Fishing Reports

Well everything seemed to settle down after the minimal tropical storm we encountered last week. The weather has been been very good, with moderate to light winds in the 5 to 12 knot range for the most part. The Mahi bite has still been fair the past few days. If you find the right piece of debris (which holds bait and keeps the mahi around), your day can be made, which happened on the Catch 22 a few days ago. They found a piece of bamboo and caught 50 mahi off it to 12 lbs! But a few other boats didn't catch any mahi, but all of them found plenty of blackfin tuna up to 10 lbs on the humps. There's also been some decent bottom fishing for tilefish and grouper in the 500' depth range. The Gon Fishin V had a mixed bag with a little bit of every thing a few days ago including a decent wahoo on the way out. The Predator had a very happy couple who caught a bunch of schoolie mahi as well as some blackfin tuna and skipjacks. On the very deep side of fishing, the Daytime Swordfish bite has been as good as ever!!! Capt. Scott on the Catch 22 put original boat owner of the "Catch 22", Charlie, on a 180 lb daytime broadbill a few days ago. Capt. Nick Stanczyk fished with George Poveromo for a couple days shooting an episode for George's TV show, which will air early 2013. The first day we caught 256 lb broadbill, and the next day we caught a few tuna, mahi, and then released an estimated 175 lb broadbill, so keep an eye out early next year for the show. We got out on the BNM today and caught a 300 lb sword on the first drop! George Poveromo went out for fun today on his boat with Carl, who ran the camera boat for two days, and after a 7 hour battle on the stand up tackle they boated a 380 lb sword! Book your Islamorada Fishing Trips for this Fall Soon!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
rick@seethefloridakeys.net
Islamorada Fishing Report

That is one big fish!

Not to mention the reel he used.

When Laura and I come down to Florida for a vacation we're definitely going out with Captain Rick! That's a huge fish! What kind of tack do you run for that? I can only imagine getting trolled and pulled into the water for one of those guys!

They use 80W shimano or similar with custom rods, similar that you'd use for blue marlin. The George fellow was using standup gear/harness too which is extra tough!