I haven't seen many S. FL reports

[Bert Rodgers]

What's the word on the sailfish bite? I'm heading down next week to fish with RT on the Hattitude.

Bert

[wtownflyfisher]

Just got back from a FL trip with the Family... ended up sneaking in a 1/2 day charter out of Key Largo Wednesday. This was my first time offshore in Florida and all I can say was that it was amazing.

Left the dock @ 7:30, out to the reef and the hoo's were basicly jumping in the pit, tons of bait. Headed out and within 2 mins of the spread hitting the water the 1st sail was on. We had consistent action through the rest of the morning, going 5 for 8 on sails, two of them from a triple. The third was close, only 10yds more and we would of been to the leader. Other than that we had 1 mahi , 1 bonito (stripbait) , and 1 small shark that came up in the spread chasing the hoo's around and finally took one. Suprisingly we must have got it in the corner of his jaw because we got it to the leader before he broke off.

Not sure how that compares to the usual 4 1/2 hrs on the water in S FL, but to a yankee who's usually surrounded by snow banks in January, it was pretty damn good to me!

[SeaMent]

What's the word on the sailfish bite? I'm heading down next week to fish with RT on the Hattitude.

Bert

Just got back from Stuart, there were a some fish caught in the Castaways and the Buc, but the real bite was in Miami they got em good down there last Saturday !! We catch a couple trollin out of Jupiter up at the Loran tower, fished a total of 4 days and caught about a dozen , plenty of Mahi around too !! The bite never really turned on for Dead Bait Trollin. Good Luck!!

[WahooKing]

January 26, 2009, Miami, Florida - When most anglers think of double-digit billfish fishing they think of foreign destinations like Guatemala and Panama; each famous for their high catch and release counts. But this past weekend demonstrated that Miami sailfish action is as hot as anywhere in the world as the Sea Vee Mercury Mayor’s Cup broke several records.

The fishing started of lightning fast. How fast? In the first hour of fishing 101 sailfish were released. The pace continued as radioman Dan Kipnis struggled to keep up with all the calls. “It was pure pandemonium,” he commented. “It’s never been quite like this. This is historic.” The hot bite continued all day as the teams were on pace to break the one-day release record of 403 releases set by the Sailfish Kickoff in 2005. Of the 55 teams fishing, more than half of them had double-digit releases and 5 teams had 20 or more releases. And what about the record? It was smashed with 422 releases in one day! The top boat for Saturday was “Get Lit” with a total of 22 releases. “Advanced Roofing” released 18 sailfish on Saturday and led the outboard division.

Advanced RoofingExpectations were high for Sunday’s fishing. Teams were hoping to eclipse Saturday’s numbers, but it would be difficult giving Saturday’s blistering pace. The second day brought plenty of lead changes and the fishing was also red hot. Again, many teams had a double-digit day with “Wound Up” having the most on Sunday with 15 releases. On the outboard side “Rock Star” had 10 releases to lead the day. In total, another 238 fish were released on Sunday bringing the two-day count to 660 releases; a 2-day tournament record in the United States!

http://www.mayorscuptournament.com/

[Deep C]

I've been retrofitting a boat for the last few weeks with very little fishing going on. One day is dolphin the next nothing then on some days the sails roar back into town... It a sporadic time of year with moments of greatness or moments of crickets chirping... We have a screamer cold front comming through right now and the boss is in town so I think we'll give it a shot in the morn. Last week was slow. The week before we wrecked the dolphin and missed a couple sails that trip...

[Bert Rodgers]

Thanks guys. RT knows as well as anyone what's going on out of St. Lucie Inlet so I'm sure he will put us an them like he always seems to.

Bert