What a wonderful few weeks we just had here in South Florida, beautiful weather and great fishing offshore Ft Lauderdale. With light winds coming from the Southeast, it’s been consistent offshore. The Lady Pamela II has been non – stop, fishing long hours and coming home with unbelievable catches.
The weather has been a bit chilly for us Fort Lauderdale locals, but we aren’t complaining, the sailfish love it. They started showing up again earlier this week when it dropped down to the low 60’s. The conditions have been perfect for kite fishing, rippin’ north current with 74 degree blue water. Kite fishing is the most productive way to land a sailfish. Daiwa Electric Reels and SFE fishing kites are the only way to go to suspend your bait where it’s dancing on the surface. Using live bait such as cigar minnows, blue runners, goggle eyes and sardines, the LP II averaged 2 – 6 bites per day last week (not too shabby). With action packed days like this, you can expect hours of bent rods and screamin reels.
On January 10th & 11th, the crew of the Lady Pamela II fished the Palm Beach Shootout aboard the Advanced Roofing, a 39′ center consol tournament fishing boat. Advanced Roofing came in 3rd place the first day catching a total of 6 fish. Day two was slow, there was barely any wind to even fly the kites. We got our first bite at 12:30 PM, a triple header, giving us a total of 9 fish. We didn’t get another bite after that, pulling us in 5th place for the Palm Beach Shootout.
Trolling just a few miles offshore, there have been a few wahoos anywhere from 25 lb – 35 lb on a full moon. Let’s not forget about the king mackerels. Trolling with strip baits and planters does the trick to land these 8 – 10 lb’ers.
Daytime swordfishing has been decent lately. Last week there were at least 20 boats 15 miles offshore daytime swordfishing and every boat caught a fish anywhere from 80 lb – 300 lb. On the other hand, nighttime swordfishing has been hit or miss. The Lady Pamela II headed offshore nighttime swordfishing last week for 9 hours and had two nice bites….both fell off. However, they did tug on an 8 1/2 ft Hammerhead shark.
Let’s get out there and go fishing to give you and your buddies something to talk about.
Tight Lines!
Captain David Ide
954-761-8045
