yellowtail snapper

March Fishing in Islamorada

Well it’s been a busy couple of weeks here while fishing in Islamorada. We’ve had some red hot action as well as a few slower days, but still always manage to catch some fish and have a great time! Today we did a half day fishing charter in the morning and dinner was the first thing on mind. We anchored in two spots until we had a enough yellowtail snapper for dinner; we stopped at a dozen fish. After that I went to the tower and searched inside the reef for cobia, and sure enough after 30 minutes found a nice school. Most of the fish were undersize, so we released a handful, but right at the end we pulled a keeper in the boat. From there we went for some more action for the ladies and caught and released a few barracuda. Yesterday we sailfished all morning, but it was slow for us. About mid day we changed up our plan and wound up limiting out on lane snapper, caught a couple bonito and small amberjack, and then also caught a couple barracuda. That the great thing when Islamorada fishing, there’s always something to catch for fun! The day before that we managed 1 sailfish release, a limit of king mackerel, a 4′ silky shark release, and a few lane snapper and trigger fish for dinner. The couple days before that we caught some yellowtail snapper each trip as well as a few mutton snapper, including a couple nice fish in the 8 – 10 lb range. We also released a handful of black and gag grouper. We will start headed offshore to the humps here with more regularity soon, but for now we are still focusing on the edge of the reef. Let me know if you’d like to get out on a islamorada offshore fishing trip!

Capt. Nick Stanczyk

bnmcharters@gmail.com

: bnm sailfish

: islamorada reef fish

: islamorada barracuda

March 6, 2013 by Capt. Rick Stanczyk Fishing Reports Offshore Fishing Reports

1-22-13 Islamorada Offshore Fishing Report for January

The Offshore Islamorada Fishing Charters have been exciting the last few days here. We catch a wide variety of fish here while fishing in Islamorada, and use quite a few different methods while doing it. Today we went out for some “deep dropping”, where we bottom fish anywhere from 400 – 600′ using multiple hook rigs. The action started right away and by noon we limited out on blueline tilefish, snowy grouper, and yellowedge grouper. These are the only grouper we can keep down here while deep sea fishing in Islamorada right now since the shallow water groupers are closed for harvest until May 1st. We then headed in for a little bit of January Reef Fishing in Islamorada and caught a keeper mutton snapper and a few other fish. Yesterday we fished 2 trips and in the morning we caught our limit of kingfish and a couple of barracuda. In the Afternoon they guys really wanted sailfish, and I explained that the Florida Keys Sailfishing had been a little tough the last few days, but they said they wanted to take the chance and knew there was a possibility we wouldn’t get any bites. After a few slow hours we finally caught a tuna and a decent snapper, and then finally got a bite from a sailfish. We released the Islamorada Sailfish after a 30 minute acrobatic fight and put the baits back out for a few more minutes. It wasn’t 2 minutes later till we hooked another sailfish and after a 10 minute fight we released our 2nd sailfish of the trip. Get on down here for some Islamorada Fishing Charters soon!

Capt. Nick Stanczyk

bnmcharters@gmail.com

: islamorada sailfish

: islamorada yellowedge grouper

: islamorada snowy grouper

: islamorada yellowtail snapper

: islamorada tuna

January 23, 2013 by Capt. Rick Stanczyk Fishing Reports Offshore Fishing Reports

1-11-13 Islamorada Reef Fishing in January

Islamorada Fishing has been very active the last couple of days! Today on our Deep Sea Florida Keys Fishing Charter we started out by catching some live ballyhoo. After we had our bait we threw a few out and caught a couple nice cero mackerel up to about 7 lbs. After that we went Kite fishing with the target species being sailfish. We had one bite a couple hours into the day and unfortuntely lost it. At about lunch time Dave asked if we could do something different to have some action at least, and I said we could definitely anchor down and probably catch some yellowtail snapper for dinner. As soon as we anchored we put a kite out for a mackerel and a sailfish piled on! We had the fish on for a few minutes and I thought we were going to catch it, but then we broke the fish off. It had been a long day up to that point, but the good news was that the yellowtails had made their way up to the back of the boat and were eating right behind the chum bag. Within an hour we caught our limit of 30 yellowtails, including one monster weighing 5 lbs! I told Dave we had an hour left to fish and we’d look for another sail. Well two minutes later I saw a frigate bird dive down and we raced over and threw out a couple ballyhoo. A pair of sailfish came up and we hooked a double header! Brad got a quick release on his first ever sail and then it was time to chase Dave’s down. After a 30 minute fight we had the beatiful sailfish next to the boat and took a few pics. We were using 15 lb test spinning tackle and he did a great job angling. Dave said it was one of the most exciting fish he ever caught and decided to get a release mount done by Gray’s Taxidermy. I’m sure the mount will look great on his wall and will last forever! Yesterday Reef Fishing in Islamorada we also caught and released 2 sailfish and caught a few mahi, which were a nice suprise since it’s January and not really season for them!