SAWFISH

RED FISH

I went backcountry alone this morning and caught a few Red Fish.  I released them all except one that swallowed my plug.
I saw a Saw Fish swimming along side my boat for about 100 yards then later on I saw what I thought was a Red Fish in the mud and threw a plug to it and started to reel in and it was another Saw Fish that I snagged.  Luckily it came loose and swam off.

Sheryl, her uncle and Craig went out to get some lobster yesterday and also did some spear fishing.

Pat and I did some Grouper fishing this morning and caught these two under size Gags.

Nice Catch

Bob caught these seven and eight pound Steelhead and three pound Brown Trout yesterday in the Little Manistee River.

Self Portrait

Captain Randall took this self portrait of himself and a seven pound Steelhead.  This looks like it should be hanging in a museum.

My cousins Ray and Judy and I did some backcountry fishing today.  We caught a lot of Jacks, Ladyfish and one Black Tip Shark.  We also caught this small Gag Grouper.

Captain Gus Ramirez and Captain Carlos had a good day yesterday aboard 'Wahoo VIII".  They caught nineteen Dolphin, some Kingfish and a ten pound Mutton Snapper.

SHARK

Danny Ritter from Miami fished with Captain Dave Perkins Saturday and caught his first Black Tip Shark.  It  gave him quite a fight even jumping a few times like Tarpon.
Captain Perkins is back in the Keys after doing a bit of fishing on Lake Michigan.  If you want to go back country or offshore Captain Perkins is the guide you want to fish with.
Check out his website in the links section "Keys Fishing Guide" or copy and paste www.captaindaveperkins.net

Blue Fish

On Wednesday Ray, Judy and I fished Pine Island Sound and caught a mixed bag.  Of course Judy is always the first to catch a trout.  I am holding a gulf of Mexico Bluefish that must have wandered in to the sound.
We were were doing good until it started to rain and we started to freeze.

Red

I went over to the west coast Tuesday and fished with my cousin Ray in his canal and caught this Redfish.

Captain Dave Perkins and his girlfriend Wilamarie hold a 15 lb. Salmon caught from the shore of Lake Michigan.

REDFISH

Captain Dave Perkins holds a Redfish caught by Michael Charley

Snapper

Captain Dave Perkins just returned from Chicago where he did a lot of fishing.  He wasted no time getting back to Keys fishing with Captain Roger Dominguez.  They caught this nice batch of Snapper and Yellotail.

Hi, I am Molly.  This my dad he went fishing with my grampa. They caught 4 grouper and released  them all.

Good Day

Pat took some time off today and joined me for a short trip backcountry. The fish were hungry today, we caught the first one 5 minutes after we got there.  The top photo is an undersized Gag that Pat caught and released.  The second photo is a 22 inch Gag that I caught and released.  The third is of a Nurse Shark that was at least 6 feet long.  I had to cut the line to release it because it got tangled around the anchor line.
The bottom photo is a 24 inch Red Grouper that we kept. I had the pole in the rod holder attached to the console.  When the fish hit it snapped the top guide off the pole.  This fish got wrapped around the same structure that the other two got wrapped around yesterday.  We used the same bait today, big Pin Fish.

26 INCH GAG

I went out looking for some Grouper today by myself, Pat was busy sewing.
I had two lines in the water with big Pin Fish as bait.  I didn't get a bite for over an hour and then I finally got an 18 inch Gag that I released.  Then I had a tremendous hit.  I could not even get the rod out of the rod holder.  The fish must have wrapped itself around some structure and finally the line snapped.
Two minutes later I had another rod bender and it got wrapped around something in the same area, but I started circling the area with the electric motor trying to get untangled.  I had the fish on for at least a half-hour.  I could not give up because I left my tackle box on the dock so I didn't even have a knife with me to cut the line.  I tried to snap the line but it would not break. After a while I opened the bail and put the rod in the rod holder.  I picked it up about 5 minutes later and the fish was loose.  It was a 26 inch Gag Grouper.

I have a lot of Pin Fish if anyone needs any.  Last week Captain Carlos put a Pin Fish trap off my dock but when he pulled it up before he went fishing it was empty.  When he came back from fishing he pulled it up and I had to run downstairs to help him pull it up because it was so heavy.  You could not have fit another fish in the trap.

Captain Gus fished with Captain Carlos yesterday aboard WAHOO VIII and caught some nice Mutton Snapper and a few Yellow Jack.

TROUT

Big Fish Bob Randall has been doing some fishing which he is usually doing.  The top photo is a 5 pound Brown Trout.  The bottom are 7 and 8 pound Steelhead.

King Salmon

Bob Randall is holding a 16 and 17 pound King Salmon he caught yesterday fishing the Manistee River in Michigan.

Mystic Connecticut

My nephew John Koblen sent me this report and photos.

Perfect weather and a great day on the water in Mystic, Connecticut produced one 28 1/2 inch Striper and seven shorts on whole squid drifted in the rip with weighted line.  The slack tide produced twenty jumbo Porgies with some double hook ups, all on squid aboard the VITAMIN C with Captain Bruce Meyers on September 10.  Sea Bass action now heating up!

Jack

 Captain Ray Leahy had a rod in the water while cleaning his boat and caught this Jack.  He also caught a few Snook.

Bob also caught this 17 lb. King Salmon.

Steelhead

Big Fish Bob Randall caught these four Steelhead.

Tuna

Charlie and Elaine Esposito's son David took an overnight trip to the canyon a few days ago and caught these nice size Tuna.

Little Snapper

My cousins Tommy and Ray and I had the pleasure of fishing with Eric the other day.
Eric is a medic in the 1ST Infantry Division and will going to Afghanistan in a few months.  We fished for Bone Fish on the ocean side flats but had no luck.  We did catch a few Snapper and a Barracuda.

TILE FISH

Captain Gus Ramirez and Captain Carlos went off shore Tuesday and caught a few Tile Fish.

BACK COUNTRY

Chip Massa and his son-in-law Scott headed to Chokoloskee the other day along with Scot's nephew Anthony and fished with  a fishing guide friend..  Anthony caught this 7 pond Tripletail.  They also caught 4 keeper reds, snook and some big Jewfish.  It was a good day.

REDFISH

Captain Paul Maggi from Key Largo caught this nice 29 inch Redfish on a strip of Ladyfish while fishing back country near Flamingo.  The fish was released unharmed.

Diving

Guy and Sue Leekey's grandson Mason likes to dive with his dad Jerry,  he also likes photograhy like his dad and took this picture of his dad while they were diving the USGCG 'Duane".

27 INCH WALLEYE

Josh, nephew of Sally and Nancy caught this walleye while on a family trip to the MI upper peninsula with the Riggs, Belman and Randall families.

Giany Trevally

This giant trevally weighed about 50 pounds.

I think I had the longest commute this morning in the history of commutting. I woke up at about 3 AM, yesterday to make the truck drive to the airport on Xmas Island. A 3 hr. flight to Hawaii, than a 5 hr. flight to LA, and then another 5 hr. flight to Newark, then a bus ride to NYC to be at work at 8 AM. I covered about 8000 miles in 20 hrs. from waking up!

WOW, what a trip !!!! The fishing was insane with about 20 different species caught. Joey and I tried for tuna and had them busting around us for a couple hrs. one morning, but we just could not get one to take anything. The GT's were our main target and we each landed a bunch of nice ones over 50 lbs.

The weather was great but windy most of the time which made for some rough water and fast drifts while jigging. There was only a few hundred yards from 100 feet deep to 300 feet deep and then it went to 1000 feet on the next drift.

We mainly jigged with 4-7 oz. jigs to the bottom and then speed jig up. It was rare if we went 5 drops without a fish from 5 lbs to 65 lbs.

I think the most exciting part of the trip was on one of my last drops on the last day using a 7 oz. jig. My line was heading down to about 200 feet, when all of a sudden, I thought I lost my jig. I started to see my line heading for the surface when I looked up to the direction of my line, only to see about a 7 foot sailfish jump out of the water with my jig in it's mouth!!!

It dove down as I set the hook and about 15 seconds later the line was heading back to the top. Another huge jump and a few second tail walk about 75 feet away from me. When he landed, I saw the line just snap and it was off. I can't explain how my heart was racing with the sailfish tail walking so close.

I have a bunch of pictures and tried picking out the better ones. I will post more during the week with a few videos as well. The week went fast, but I am not sure how much more my hands and arms could take of that type of fishing. I have more cuts on my hand from fighting and landing and releasing fish then I have ever had.
Dan
I wish I had the time to explain each picture, but ask away and I will try to best answer them.
From the Kayak Fishing Stuff forum

NEW JERSEY PIKE

Pikezilla !!!!

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"After a few crazy work days in a row, I had plans of hitting the salt last night, but when the alarm went off at 2 AM, I shut it off and slept until 7. I hit the Passaic and was not expecting much with the stained water and water levels higher than I prefer.

WOW, was I wrong! I landed at least 6 pike with a few drops at the kayak and a few strikes and misses, with a few bass just to keep things active.

Then I hit an area that usually produces a fish or two. On my first cast I had a solid follow to the kayak with a smaller fish, but he never committed on the spinner bait. After getting pushed around by the current and trying to stay in the zone, I circled around and made a cast and got slammed by a huge pike!

It was a solid hookup and this fish towed me around in circles for what seemed like 10 minutes. At least 5 great runs across the river, and he was heading straight for some logs sticking up in the river. Of course, my line gets tangled around one and I thought for sure the fish would get off or the line would break. I managed to free the line and the fish was off again.

After thinking that he was "almost done", I started to paddle to shore with one hand and try to stay out of the current for a few pictures.

I may have caught one or two longer pike in the river, but this one was by far the heaviest pike that I have landed. I measured the fish against my paddle and it was just at 44 inches. It was a two hand job just to lift it out of the water.

Here are a few pictures before the fish drenched me after the release."

Danny

My friend Danny does a lot of kayak fishing all over the world.  He just retured from a fiahing trip to Christmas Island in the South Pacific.  I will try to get some of those pictures on the blog.

These photos are of a fishing trip that my cousin Ray's friend and fishing buddy Ed Pinera took to the Dry Tortugas last week. They caught a lot of snapper, grouper and amber jack.