Big game fishing season is here! Shark fishing season officially started February 1 here in Fort Lauderdale. Every year, from February throughout May, the giant sharks make their migration down our coastline. They hug the Gulfstream current edge which typically resides about a mile and a half offshore of Fort Lauderdale beach in about 350ft of water. They come through kind of like the traffic on I-95. Sometimes there’s just a few of them coming down the highway and sometimes it’s RUSH hour. I’ve seen 3 sharks in the 8-9ft range, fighting over the same bait on the kite. We have an awesome shark season in Fort Lauderdale and it’s just getting started in 2016.
These big game sharks are only coming through because here is where the food is. Kingfish are biting spectacularly this month. I’ve seen a lot of huge kings hitting the dock, some in the 20-30 pound range or bigger. It’s great to see the kingfish biting so good because we’ve had such a bad past couple years on kingfish. This year seems much better than the past couple years so far. Blackfin tuna are also spread out all over the place out there. They are mostly small this time of year, the size of a football. But there are lots of them and they are good eating… perfect sushi size or for fish tacos. These kingfish and tunas are why the sharks are here, lots of available food.
There’s some good catches of mahi-mahi and wahoo lately too. The best trip for these is our All Day Fishing Trip as if gives you a lot of fishing time to cover the most possible territory. If you cover enough ground out there, you eventually will hit dolphin. The time it takes to hunt these down pays off in an instant with a lucky spotting of a frigate bird circling or a keen eye spotting a floating tree branch or other form of debris. One lucky find can yield a school of fish and make the day.
Some odds and ends that are biting out there are cobia, amberjack, and snappers. I wouldn’t call this the best time of the year for bottom fishing, but it shouldn’t be overlooked. There are a lot of nice fish biting on the bottom this time of year, it’s just there is good action on the topwater fish so many people aren’t bottom fishing. And also groupers are out of season, further lessening the rewards of going bottom fishing. But there is good action on the snappers, pretty much all the different species of them, and a few big fish moving in on the wrecks such as amberjacks and cobia. You will see these larger fish biting better and better as get closer to Spring because by Spring, wreck fishing will be the hottest action there is. The fish all begin showing up and populating the wrecks this month.
Sailfish season is winding down. There is still a good bite going on, especially with these cold fronts that are moving through. I hope the chilly weather continues for a little while because it will keep the sailfish active for another 6+ weeks. Sailfish are the most sought after gamefish in the world and this is the best time of year to get them. But you better get out there quick because it will be over soon. Good luck to everyone fishing the next few days. I’ll sea ya on the water.
