Fishing Reports
Please - No More Wind
Report Date: May 26, 2007
This is the time of year that the wind is supposed to lay down and everyone should be on the water catching fish. Unfortunately the wind gods don’t see it that way and this has been the windiest week I have ever seen in May. It has been blowing out of the NE at 20 -35mph for one week straight. I had booked swordfish trips for almost every night this week and this holiday weekend and so far have been blown out on every trip. Hopefully we can salvage the rest of the holiday weekend as the wind is supposed to come down just a little bit. It is still going to be rough but hopefully it will be fishable.
Before the wind blew, there were plenty of dolphin offshore. The dolphin were from 300ft of water well out into 1100 feet. These trips were your typical run and gun trips were you were running around in the Gulfstream looking mostly for birds and debris. Once you find what you’re looking for, you usually scored on dolphin. All our dolphin trips were successful so far. After catching dolphin in the Stream, we have been coming back to the edge and fishing for tunas, kings and sails. Luckily we have been successful there as well. The kings have been schoolie size from 5 to 15 pounds, but the blackfin tunas have been on the bigger size with most tunas going between 25 to 35 pounds.
With the new fishing regulations in the Bahamas, we have very few trips booked to the islands. I am still going over in June to target the yellowfin tunas, but do not have any bottom fishing trips booked for Bimini this year. If you ask me, the new Bahamian fishing laws are not very practical, but going to the islands is still a great experience. The island life is laid back, you can still catch fish and there is always catch and release. Rumor has it that the Bahamians are going to change the fishing rules again and make them a bit more fisherman friendly. Hopefully this will happen soon as islands like Bimini really rely on fisherman coming over from South Florida.
As soon as the wind lies down, I’ll keep you posted as to what is biting.
Tight Lines,
Capt. Dean Panos