09-10-2004, 12:48 AM
Hurricane Frances came and went and once again the Miami area dodged another direct hit. We did get our share of windy weather. The highest reading I saw from Fowey Light was sustained winds of 51.75 mph with gusts to 56.25 mph. The folks further to the north did not fair as well and many are still without power and phones.
After being off the water for many days, it was time to get out and do some reel testing today. There have been some dolphin and the good news is that they have been in quite close. Inside of 600' has seen all the action. Also, there have been a good number of sailfish in the area.
Our search for live bait took us to two different locations. In each, there were loads of medium size sardines. Despite using the 3/8" mesh net, lots of the baits got gilled up in the net. After cleaning out the net from the first throw, we moved to location number 2 that had an even large concentration of sardines. There were also some good sized pilchards mixed in with them. One throw and we had plenty of bait and another gilled up net. The gilled baits were used as chum and they finally did the trick.
There was a very good current edge in about 320' off of Haulover Park. By our third drift, we had drifted north to the north end of Golden Beach. We watched a small shark swim up to and all around the boat and not eat a bait. It finally lost interest and moved on. Chumming heavy with both dead and live sardines finally did the trick in 340' and Bruce Newman was hooked up solid with a very feisty 4' long sailfish. It put on a great aerial show both at a distance and up close to the boat. After releasing it, we made one more quick drift and decided to call it a day.
There is decent fishing action, however, we'll have to wait and see what Hurricane Ivan is going to do. Lets hope it makes a turn away from Florida and gives everyone a break.
Captain Dave Kostyo
Knot Nancy Fishing Charters
305 620-5896 Charter
305 732-2628 Beeper
305 965-9454 Cell
www.knotnancy.com
nkostyo@bellsouth.net
[signature]
After being off the water for many days, it was time to get out and do some reel testing today. There have been some dolphin and the good news is that they have been in quite close. Inside of 600' has seen all the action. Also, there have been a good number of sailfish in the area.
Our search for live bait took us to two different locations. In each, there were loads of medium size sardines. Despite using the 3/8" mesh net, lots of the baits got gilled up in the net. After cleaning out the net from the first throw, we moved to location number 2 that had an even large concentration of sardines. There were also some good sized pilchards mixed in with them. One throw and we had plenty of bait and another gilled up net. The gilled baits were used as chum and they finally did the trick.
There was a very good current edge in about 320' off of Haulover Park. By our third drift, we had drifted north to the north end of Golden Beach. We watched a small shark swim up to and all around the boat and not eat a bait. It finally lost interest and moved on. Chumming heavy with both dead and live sardines finally did the trick in 340' and Bruce Newman was hooked up solid with a very feisty 4' long sailfish. It put on a great aerial show both at a distance and up close to the boat. After releasing it, we made one more quick drift and decided to call it a day.
There is decent fishing action, however, we'll have to wait and see what Hurricane Ivan is going to do. Lets hope it makes a turn away from Florida and gives everyone a break.
Captain Dave Kostyo
Knot Nancy Fishing Charters
305 620-5896 Charter
305 732-2628 Beeper
305 965-9454 Cell
www.knotnancy.com
nkostyo@bellsouth.net
[signature]