It's the last day of 2008 and it's been another very successful year of fishing for me aboard Knot Nancy. I'd like to thank everyone who fished with me this past year and look forward to fishing with you again in 2009. I very much appreciate your business and confidence in me and will continue to work hard to make your fishing dreams come true.
To all the people who will fish with me for the first time you can be assured that I will do everything I can to make sure you have a pleasurable trip. Making your dreams of catching a fish that you've only seen on TV shows come true is one of the things that I enjoy most about being a fishing guide.
Lets start with the offshore. The good news is that we've finally gotten some good blue water and good north current in close. This means that the sailfishing has picked up and there are still dolphin passing through the South Florida area. We've had more than our share of very windy weather and this too has calmed down. On two of my recent trips, I've had either one or two anglers feel the effects of the ocean motion.
Now for the OUTSTANDING news. Tarpon fishing is red hot in the winter time spots. Live shrimp is the ticket and there are plenty of fish and they are hungry and eager to please.
As I mentioned before, two of my trips involved windy weather with winds as high as 22 knots. To the die hard sail fisherman, this is perfect weather, however, to the casual angler it's mighty rough. Both trips were cut short, but not before catching dolphin and kingfish.
The wind calmed down and Monty Rabner and his 8 year old son, Jake spent some quality guy time together. Jake caught his fish kingfish and yellowtail snapper and we had a shot at a sailfish, but it decided to give us back our hook as it came charging toward the boat.
Brothers Court and Herb Conover fished and afternoon/evening trip. We worked hard and got our reward late in the afternoon when Herb did battle with a very large and feisty sailfish. This was only a warm up for what was to follow as dusk and darkness came on. By 6 pm we had our baits out for tarpon. It didn't take long for a silver beauty to find a shrimp. For the remainder of the evening, we seemed to get a tarpon strike on every other drift. By the end of the trip, we had put in 3 hours of effort to catch tarpon and were rewarded with four Silver King in the 40 - 70 pound class. There was no hogging of the rods and Court and Herb each caught and released two fish.
The next night, I had three Cincinnati fans, Dan Young, Joe Young, and Jeff Whited who had never caught tarpon before. They were really psyched to catch one. The tarpon were just as psyched to show them what tarpon fishing is all about. One our first drift, Joe got his chance. We got the fish up to the boat and got the catch, however, the tarpon was camera shy and gave us back our hook on its third jump. Next it was Jeff's turn and he got to pull on a hard fighting tarpon. His fish also was camera shy. Dan was up next and a few drifts later he too was connected to a mean and nasty tarpon. A lull in the action and a couple of ladyfish and a blue runner filled in the time. Then the fish turned on again and it was time for round two for each angler. By the end of the evening we were 6 for 7 on tarpon in the 40 pound class. They also got less camera shy and the entire roll of film was used up getting some get boat side and action shots. Each angler had realized his dream of catching a tarpon and are now hooked on tarpon fishing. Wait till you get your first 100 pound fish guys. The sight of 6 foot of silver dynamite clearing the water in a 6 foot high jump will have your adrenaline rushing.
Jeff Godel, Luke Boe, and Dave Bonebreak closed out 2008 with a bang. Blue water, north current and light wind had us using a helium balloon to keep the kite up. Along with two flatlines, we worked our way north from the Sea Buoy. The kite saw the first action and then a flatline. Both fish were large bonito and Jeff said he could catch these fish all day long. The baits went back out and the flatline saw the next action this time it was a sailfish and Luke had his hands full. He did an outstanding job of keeping pressure on the fish and after what seemed like an eternity, the sailfish finally gave in to the pressure and Luke had caught his first sailfish. After that excitement, the action slowed down as the current slowed down.
That sums up the action through December 31st. January means more sailfish and more tarpon. The dates are beginning to fill up so don't hesitate and lose out on getting in on the action. It's just a phone call or email to get a date scheduled and realize your dream of catching a quality monster fish.
See you on the edge.
Captain Dave Kostyo
Knot Nancy Fishing Charters, Inc.
305-965-9454 cell
305-620-5896 charter
www.knotnancy.com
nkostyo@bellsouth.net