TWO PIRATES LOOK AT SEVENTY: BAHAMAS BAIT

We spent New Year's Eve on the boat at the World Wide Sportsman. We partied on the dock with Captain Billy Chapman of the Captain Cadillac and his friends. The Captain Cadillac is the sister to Feeding Frenzy III. It was the first 35 Luhrs off the assembly line and FF III was the eighth. We had a birds eye view of the fireworks from the bow of our boat and the next morning we had a bird's eye view of this pelican.

From 2013-01-19

After a couple days off, one to party and one to recuperate, it was time to go fishing again. We hooked up with another of Kenny Spalding's mates, Tim Johnson. Tim did not drive as he had lost his license to a DWI. Fishing does kind of drive you to drink :) We picked Tim up at the Islamorada Tackle Center, our new favorite place to shop for tackle and bait, right next to Lorelei. We were going to do some reef fishing for Yellowtail snapper this morning and also try to catch some more Ballyhoo's for Sailfish. We picked up a few small yellow jig heads to use with frozen shrimp for bait for the YT's and we were off. Tim's favorite spot to anchor up was just south of the Tennessee Lighthouse in 47 feet of water. Of course when we got there that spot was taken so his second choice was just outside the fishing preserve just east of the lighthouse. We anchored up in about 30 feet of water and set our chum out so the slick would drift along the edges of the preserve and lure the fish out, and boy did it work. We immediately had lots of bait fish behind the boat and soon after, the YT showed up. We caught 21 keeper YT's flatlining bits of frozen shrimp and pieces of squid. We had dinner and then some. We also caught 3 Grouper bottom fishing that measured about 18 inches, which we released. But the coolest thing was the Ballyhoo. They were thick. We took a break from Snapper fishing and Tim threw the cast net a few times. We loaded up! After we had all the YT's and Hoos we wanted we pulled up anchor and made a couple runs at the Sails. They still weren't cooperating so we headed in. I'm not sure if we were schooled on Sailfishing or if the Sailfish took us to school. We learned a lot about how to fish for them, we didn't learn much about how to catch them, but we will try again. Here is what 200 Hoos look like on ice.