Stay Safe And Healthy!

Report Date: April 6, 2020

I hope everyone is staying healthy and doing their best during these difficult times. A year ago, who would have known that we would not be fishing every day and enjoying one of the best months South Florida fishing has to offer. With that said though, we will get through this and come out stronger than ever. As you would imagine, South Florida has been hit very hard economically. Restaurants, hotels, casinos, entertainment and recreational activities have been put on lock down. Charter fishing has been placed on complete lockdown for over 3 weeks now, but light is on the horizon. I’m not an expert but I would imagine we will be able to resume business some time in early May, which would be great news since May is another great month to fish in South Florida.

For now, though let’s tell about some great fishing we had before all this started. The peak of sailfish season has been getting later and later in the season these past few years and this year was no exception. On March 7th we had a great day of sailfishing. We had strong north wind and strong north current with blue water pushed all the way in. I had a father and son out on there first charter with us and they hit the lucky day. We had 24 sailfish bites and caught 19 of them. All the bites were on the kites, but the cool part of that day is that we would see them sailfish tailing down sea and maneuver the boat to put the kite baits in their path. This often resulted in a multiple hookup of 2, 3 or 4 sailfish on at one time. It was an absolute great day of fishing. The sailfish slowed down but was still very good following that trip and then about a week or so later we had another great day. That day I had a family of 4 out and we had absolutely no wind. Not even enough wind to fly a kite with a helium balloon. There was a slight trickle of north current but there was a very defined edge. We put the live baits out of the riggers and bumped in and out of gear to keep the baits up top. We saw a freejumper (sailfish free jumping in the distance) and quickly maneuvered the boat in his anticipated path. A few minutes later we had a sailfish in the spread and before you knew it, we had a quad on (4 at once). I believe we caught 3 out of the 4. After we caught those fish, I ran full speed south to try to get in front of that pack. We set up again and within a few minutes had a triple on. After that triple we ran south on the pack again and hooked a double. We ran south again and hooked another double. At that point we were 9 for 11 on sails plus a bunch of bonitos. We put them out again and after a short while we hooked a single and at that we ended the day going 10 for 12 on sailfish with no wind and no kites.

That was pretty much the end of our trips and now we are looking forward to getting back out and getting in on that action again. With more time on our hands, I have been working on all my tackle, including reels, leaders, deep drop rigs windons etc. Everything is going to be in great shape by the time we get back. At this point I would like to thank all my customers for their support. You can only imagine the amount of cancellations I have had and with the exception of one customer, all of them told me to hold the deposit and they will reschedule when this is all said and done. Not to worry though, I have cancelled my cancellation policy for coronavirus issues and the deposits are good for as long as it takes for my customers to get back down here. With that said, I am going to ask my local customers to get back out and go fishing with us as soon as we are allowed and as soon as you are financially stable to do so. We have some great fishing months coming up! The sailfish bite will be great well into the end of May, and we will be in the two best months for blackfin tunas. Soon we will also be starting our summer mahi trips as well as our summer trips to the Bahamas. The most important thing though is to stay safe and healthy knowing that great fishing is coming real soon!

Tight Lines,
Capt. Dean Panos

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