The fishing this time of year gets a little different than the usual Flamingo fishing for me. I like to target the Mutton Snappers and big Yellow Jacks that roam the edge of the Biscayne Bay Flats. The key is to find schools of Pilchards, load up your live wells and then go chum them up. This is purely fun fishing at its best with lots of by catch of Mangrove Snappers, Groupers, Yellowtail Snappers, Cuda's and of course the Sharks always show up for a free meal.
At the same time we are getting the first wave of the Mullet run coming down the coast and have made their way onto Miami Beach. The Tarpon follow and put on an incredible show. The Snook and Jacks are also right in the middle of all the action.
With all that going on I still have to make trips to Everglades National Park. This past weekend I fish the Romp in the Swamp Tournament out of Port of the Isles. The format is most inches of Snook, Redfish and Trout fish with my son James, my buddy Paul and his son PJ. The day started out good. We found Tarpon, Snook and a Redfish in a small cove chasing bait. I hate leaving active Tarpon but we had a game plan of making a long run south, it didn't pay off because of a S.W. wind and dirty water.
We ran back to the area we started out. I saw a blow up out of the corner of my eye while running. I turned around and found the mother load of bait getting blown out of the water. All 3 anglers hooked up with Snook, Redfish and Jacks. We worked it until they quit biting. We had Snook up to 32 inches and Reds to 24. All we needed now was a Trout to complete the Slam. We caught the Trout with minutes to spare in the tournament. Lots of stress and fun.
All fish were caught on Rapala Twitch and Raps, Gulp swimming Mullets. The winning team had 86 inches and we were at 72 inches taking 12 place out of 85 boats. We were surprised during award ceremony when they called our team name for Top Junior Angler
The next couple months will have plenty of action, the hardest part is figuring out whereto go. That’s where I come in. Give me a call at 305 333 8149 and I will advise you on what’s best. There’s allot of fun and some great action to be had.
Capt. Jim Hobales
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