First Cold Front !

Report Date: November 28, 2013

We have switched gears and are in “sailfish mode” now, but that doesn’t mean we are not catching other fish as well. Since the last report, I have done two daytime swordfish trips and we caught swordfish on both trips. The first trip we had a very heavy bend in the rod and initially thought it was bottom. You usually get a tap on the rod tip and slowly tease the fish to bite, sometimes you get a tap and then the rod loads up, but on this fish the rod simply started bending over hard. For the first five minutes we never gained any line, but we also never lost any line. The peculiar thing was that with the Gulfstream we should have been drifting north, but instead we were being pulled south. After about 5 minutes we started to slowly gain some line, but slowly is the key word. Now we are wondering maybe this could be a thresher shark, but we didn’t have any of the tell tale tail thumps you see when you are fighting a thresher. Then all of a sudden the rod goes completely slack. Now we know for sure that it is a big swordfish, as only a swordfish can swim the lead up and start flying towards the surface. About 500 feet from the surface, the big fish slows down and starts fighting again. As we inch her up we get the lead off the wind on leader but she took back off and then came racing back and jump completely out of the water and landed within inches of the bow. She practically jumped in the boat. She immediately dumped the leader again and was dumping mainline when she stopped and with incredible speed swimming on the top came at the boat at full speed. Everyone thought she was going to ram the boat and moved a bit back. Seconds from impact she tilted her head down and swam completely under the boat. Although she was fast a set of Mercury 300 Verados were quicker and I spun the boat around in reverse and got her from under the boat. With the swivel at the rod tip and the fish within a few feet of the boat we let this awesome animal swim again. The angler had a flight out in a few hours and there was no way nor had the time to take this fish back home. Although we have killed a lot of big swords, it was a good feeling to watch this 400 pounder swim away. I can say she was one of the meanest swordfish we have had in a while and hopefully she will pass that on to her next few generations.

The majority of trips we have done have been sailfish trips and we have been successful on all of them but one. The one we didn’t get any sails we still caught plenty of other fish. We have had plenty of cold fronts approach our area but today had our first major cold front come completely through the area. Our temperature actually got into the 50’s for the first time this season. The past few fronts which didn’t make it all the way through were still enough to drive the sailfish south, and this last front should definitely move more fish into our waters. Hopefully we will start seeing double digit releases real soon.

The holidays are rapidly approaching and if you need a great gift for that special someone in your life, consider giving him or her a gift certificate for full day fishing on board the “Double D“. Just contact me and I can set that up for you. Also with the holidays just weeks away, if you have friends or family in town or are coming to South Florida, now is the time to book that trip as the holiday week is usually very busy and right now I still have openings. What a great way to enjoy the holidays than going out and catching some sailfish and having a good time with family and friends.

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Tight Lines,
Capt. Dean Panos

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