Vermilion Reef Saturday

[Tarpon4me]

[font "Verdana"][size 2]It was a slow ride out yesterday. The rolls were a little bigger and a little closer than we had anticipated (jeneric), but we pushed through them, for what Jeneric says, was his best day bottom fishing yet. We noticed the temp was still way down, probably an average of around 68 degrees, with the exception of a couple nice rips pretty close to the reef. On the way, we ran into some dophin (not dorado) and they hooked up on the bow for a mile or so. Pretty cool, and I got some great video. We saw some floating debree in the water on the way as well. We stopped and I tossed on it a few times, but nothing was under it.

We got to the reef and starting a drift over some live bottom. My son dropped a cigar minnow down on a chicken rig, and hooked a 13.5 pound Red Grouper. What a nice fish, and no crap, very first drop. We continued to hit a few drift patterns and snagged some nice silver snapper, B-Liners, and grunts. Jeneric caught a monster silver on the last drift. It must have weighed 5 or 6 pounds. The fillets are almost 2 inches thick.

We decided to get anchored on the reef and dropped the ball. It was very nice, first anchor drop and we were on the ball. The fishing was a little slower on the reef, but they were there. Mosty B-liners for a while, so we let a little more anchor line out. I switched to solo cigar minnows and bagged a sweet Rainbow Grouper on the second drop. What a beautiful fish. We caught a couple more nice Silvers and decided to hit the ledges on the way back in. You can imagine, i'm already tired by now. Had a couple coronas, nice little sun burn, and my back felt like cream of chicken soup. But, the ledge sounding like fun if we could hook a couple nice AJ's. We never found an AJ, but I found a big surprise on the second ledge. I had switched to a fish finder rig and dropped a huge cigar over the side. I got slammed and thought for sure I was hung. NOPE, it tugged back and it was on. Another beautiful Red Grouper, 12 pounds even. What a treat, except for my poor back. LOL Didn't see anymore grouper for the day, but the last ledge we got on produced some nice BSB, infact, Jeneric caught his personal best, which was the largest BSB i've ever seen in my life. Monster fish, I could stick my fist in his mouth. We fished until the cigar minnows were gone, and headed back. Not a moment too soon either, it was 3-5 with the occasional 6 back in. Good thing we had a south wind. They were close, and we were wet. But man what a day. Limit on silvers, 2 reds (grouper), 1 rainbow, atleast a dozen b-liners (not counting what we threw back), 6 or 7 seabass, and 6 or 7 grunts. Wish you could have been there Doc.[/size][/font]
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