02-01-2002, 02:32 AM
This week like last week has required a lot of work to produce fish in the offshore environment. The one bright spot was a good sailfish bite on Wednesday. There have been a few sailfish caught each day. Kingfish are still very scarce. Dolphin made a bit of a showing.<br><br>The most reliable fishing has been for tarpon in the evening. Government Cut is the place as the tarpon have disappeared from the Haulover area. Live shrimp on an Eagle Claw L197 5/0 will increase your hook up ratio.<br><br>On Sunday, 1/27, we fished for tarpon at Government Cut. Four strikes and 2 caught and released fish. The highlight of the evening was 13 year old Drew Davis catching his first tarpon. He said he wanted a big one and he got his wish, a 100 pounder.<br><br>Half day morning trip on Monday 1/28 found us off the north end of Key Biscayne on a blue edge in 120'. A 12# bull dolphin was the highlight of the trip. We also found a dead sailfish floating on the green side of the edge. During the evening trip to Government Cut on Monday, a father and son spent some quality time together and released one tarpon each. Also caught were 1 ladyfish, 1 red grouper, and a 3# mangrove snapper.<br><br>Tuesday the 29th it was back to daytime fishing. Starting south of Fowey Light in 100', we quickly caught a large bonito and got cut off by a toothy critter. With no further action, we moved offshore and found a huge weed line with everything you could ask for in it. The only problem was that the dolphin had not found it. We jumped from large patch to large patch and finally found a few finicky feeding dolphin. We boated an 8# bull. Before heading in for the day we spent about 20 minutes on an edge in 150' and caught another 8# bull dolphin.<br><br>Back to evening tarpon fishing at Government Cut on Wednesday the 30th. The wind picked up and kicked up the seas to 3-5 feet. On our third drift we got our reward and caught & released a 70# tarpon. The next drift was cut short by one of the anglers experiencing motion sickness. We tried the calmer waters of the main ship channel with no luck and also made one drift at Haulover.<br><br>That brings us to Thursday the 31st. Wind from the east @ 15-18 mph, clean green water starting in 80', and lots of rocking and rolling. Fishing the area from 71 street to Sunny Isles had us watching very active kite baits for 6 hours along with lots of flying fish scattering about. The end result was not even a nervous bait.<br><br>I'll be in Ft. Myers on Saturday, February 2nd at the Florida Sportsman Show, so if you are in the area drop by the Shakespeare display and say "Hello". Next week is more evening tarpon fishing and lets hope that the offshore fishing lights up.<br><br>Captain Dave Kostyo<br>Knot Nancy Fishing Charters<br>www.rnfl.com/knotnancy<br>nkostyo@bellsouth.net<br>305 620-5896 Charter<br>305 732-2628 Beeper<br><br>