Are you ready for Spring Break yet? I am! I know it has been a tough year where many of my guests live and come from. I know February is the beginning of nearing the end of the brutal winter grind and getting a day on the water in the Florida Keys is the best medicine to bring you back to life. It sure is a nice reminder that winter can’t last forever. Even better, our crappy days are still better than your good days right now!
Locally, we have had mostly really nice conditions and trip to trip we have always produced a ton of catches. Each trip is unique and many variables determine what we do and what we catch. I get asked the specifics all of the time and there is no correct answer. The biggest factor above any question you have about what we catch or how many of this or that is……..what can you do? What do you know how to do? Are you a good listener and learner? The most successful anglers and the best trips I regularly have start with the same foundation. A visitor here on vacation from anywhere with little experience or none at all that can listen, take instruction, learn through the process and scale up. That is what my trips are built around. I will close my blog with an elaboration of this reality.
I have not run any offshore trips (far offshore) for months. Nobody has asked, but I hear the tuna bite is good. Sharks have been bad. Most of my trips have been half day reef trips. Again, each trip looks a little bit different based on all of the variables and moving parts. On morning trips I start on the deep reef and fish my way back to the dock. On afternoon trips, we reverse that generally speaking. On the deep reef, yellowtail snapper are the main target and they feed early and late. On the deep edge we have shots at a few snapper species, mackerel, jacks and grouper (catch and release). Often this is our best chance to put meat in the cooler if you want a few fresh fish dinners.
On the shallower reefs we get more into multi species opportunities with usually less technique heavy conditions. Essentially, dumber fish that are easier to catch. This is usually high volume fishing that requires us to process more fish to get meat in the cooler, but can produce up to 13 species in a 4 hour trip. Each drift is a chance to catch a small, medium or large fish, so you have to be ready. February, March and April is the best time of year for these shallower reefs. It is great for families and beginners, but provided enough of a challenge that can be fine tuned up to anglers with more experience. I really enjoy the reward of teaching people to succeed through the scale up to land some pretty big fish on very light tackle. In case you are wondering what that means, our water us pretty clear compared to most places. Our reef fish are smarter than the majority of my anglers understand. Once they see our line, hook or flaws in our tackle or presentation, you have little to no chance of sustained success. My equipment is geared towards being on the lighter side. It gets more bites. Having more chances is a good thing!
In windy or compromised weather situations, the shallow bay side has been and always is a great option. It’s an easy pivot to keep us in calmer waters and keep the rods bent. Typically mangrove snapper our the target species, but we often catch grouper, jacks, mackerel and other snapper species. This fishery is pretty easy and is a safe bet for family fishing with young kids, Like reef fishing, this is scalable depending on our desired target and time of year. Spring brings periods of wind sometimes for a week or more. Bay trips keep us fishing in comfort when other options won’t work.
I am looking forward to running more snorkeling and in the water trips as our local waters warm up. I operated a snorkeling trip yesterday (2/1/25) and had a great trip. We had to run around a bit to find good clean water and found 74 degree water and 40 feet of blue water visibility. Sometimes visibility prevents us from running a trip, but there are always other options to keep the trip. By checking in with me by phone we discuss the conditions and go over options based on anticipated conditions. Sometimes we may have to adjust and divert to a sandbar trip, a short fishing trip or a shallow water exploring trip to make it work.
In other news, things are looking good for 2025 charters. I got ahead of the tariffs and replaced my engines, some of my electronics, pumps and cushions to prevent a rate increase for my services. This way I keep my operation in peak shape to ensure your trip does not risk cancellation due to mechanical breakdowns. I also upgraded my website…..and it’s having some growing pains that is hopefully temporary. If you have any difficulty in the booking process please reach out to me at 305 481-0589. I am most easily reached after 6pm when I’m home.
I’m going to finish with one of my biggest challenges in operation my business. I match trips to you. Yes, I hear what you want to do. We discuss it. We sure do. We make a plan and you are the one in front of the plan on the day of your trip. Preparation, effort and time has gone into doing whatever we planned. What happens when we are there doing it and…….you have nothing to bring to the activity. That’s a nice way of saying you don’t know how to do anything and it’s just not going to work. If it is a 4 hour trip, I lost half our time to make something work by the time we pivot. That’s bad. Here is how I do it and it works. We start with the basics that I know will work. It is a 3 step pattern that we repeat throughout the trip. Imagine instructing an adult that has never opened a door before on how to open a door in 3 simple steps. That’s essentially what I’m doing with you on my trips through basic instruction. So many trips we are into hour 3 and we do not have the ability through instruction to open the door. I don’t understand it. It’s painful to watch. Opening the door is where we start on my trips. It’s not hard. Once you get it, we add a little more to it. We scale up. We progress. We experience success and we build that up. About a billion times I have heard how someone fishes differently somewhere else. Ok. I understand that. Great story. Now listen to me. Point the rod at the fish you want to catch. Let the line out to match the speed of the current. When the line goes faster, close the bail and reel quickly. That’s it. That’s all I’m asking. That’s reef fishing. That’s how it works. I can’t make it any easier then that. Please let me know if you can think of an easier way to do it. And that is your February update! I hope to see you soon!!
Thanks!!!!
Oh, I recently got some customer pictures from a trip. One shot was of me doing what I do on every trip. We catch a ton of fish on my charters. Sometimes people take pictures, sometimes not a single one. Once in a while I get a chance to grab my camera to take a picture in the moment. More often I am busy with properly handling a fish and setting up a picture to be taken on a customer’s camera. Bigfoot is seen more than the amount of pictures my customers send me after I ask after a trip. I ask everybody…”Can you send me some pics from this or this?” Maybe 1 out of 20 trips do I see those. I have a lot going on when I’m helping you. When I’m cleaning your fish you usually have a good chunk of sitting around time. Maybe a few pics and a google review would be nice. I’m cleaning your fish on my time, not trip time. Maybe we can trade and help each other? Just a thought.
