My buddy Richard and I met in the morning and headed for the Marathon Hump. We had planned to catch a few big blackfin tunas and then put a few mahi mahi in the boat. When we reached the Hump, I started trolling a route I have established and followed for more than two decades. Boy, that makes me feel old.
Usually, I’ll make at least one pass over my preferred route, before I start catching fish. This morning, however, I reached the beginning point of the route and one of the lines started screeching. Turned out, the first fish we caught was the biggest tuna of the day. What a great way to start a fishing trip.
We passed through an area along our route that was disturbed and frothy with black fin tunas breaking the surface, and showing themselves as they chased down schools of bait fish. It’s always exciting to see feeding tunas and watch them as they attack the spread of lures. “Fish on,” Richard yelled. We were running around 2,000 RPM, a little faster than I usually troll for mahi, but just perfect for enticing tuna to gobble smaller lures. Almost immediately, two more lines were hit, the rods bent over and drags cried.
“We’re tripled,” I called out. Everything got hit except the rigged ballyhoo. I was not surprised. When we got the fish to the boat, we decided they were too small to keep and released them. We had set our sights on catching larger tunas. We reduced the area we would fish so we could keep from running into this school of small fish again. We kept fishing for a while and put a few, much bigger, fish in the box.
I like to leave the Hump by 11:30 or so. I have found the bite quiets down around this time and it makes for a great time to clean the boat, make sure the fish are covered in ice, change tactics, and tackle, and have lunch comfortably while trolling toward home looking for mahi mahi.
It’s also a great time to have some peace and quiet after the mayhem and chaos common on the Hump when the bite is hot.
Richard and I settled into some relaxed conversation and relived the tuna fishing we had just done, pointing out things we did right, and things we did wrong, and how we can improve what we do in the future. This is something most dedicated fishermen do and it’s a favorite part of the day for me. Unless, of course, I’m the one who did something wrong.
When we had moved away from the Hump with no luck, we pulled the lines and headed quickly for some big weed patches we went through earlier in the morning. We had stopped once or twice to throw some cut bait in the water, but not for long. We even trolled a few lines along a pretty tight weedline, but not for long. Sometimes, it’s difficult not to get sidetracked when heading for the Hump. But we remembered where we saw these weedlines and patches and already talked about hitting them on the way home from the Hump.
We could see the brown color of weeds from far off ahead of us and both got excited. We slowed down to trolling speed. When we reached the first weedline, I turned and followed it as closely as possible without getting my baits tangled up in weeds. Nothing was happening and we headed toward home, still trolling. We did this for thirty minutes or so, pulled the lines again and ran at high speed for a while.
By now we were in 450 feet of water. We could clearly see Bonefish Towers and Sombrero Lighthouse. “Let’s troll to 250 feet and then we’ll call it a day,” I said to Richard. This is the way my buddies and I used to end a fishing trip when I was fishing out of Port Canaveral. We would reach our first depth destination then make another, shallower destination. Richard and I started doing the same right here. At 250 feet, we changed it to 225, then 200. We ran into some patches of weed. During the day, the patches had tightened up a little, which left larger clear water areas between them. We could squeeze through the clear water and not get weeded up. We pulled the baits in, closer to the boat, and slowed down. We were able to keep the lines clean by carefully maneuvering.
At two-hundred feet, we changed our goal, and decided to troll to 150. We inspected all the baits and reset the downrigger. We were snaking through some tricky weeds when we reached 150 feet. We didn’t say anything. You know how fisherpersons can be. We never want to stop. A clear opening around half the size of the Winn Dixie parking lot came into view and we motored right into it.
POP! The downrigger snapped. Line screamed and a green-and-gold rocket flash-danced on the water behind the boat. “Fish on. Fish on,” we both yelled. “Mahi mahi,” both of us yelled.
One hundred-forty feet of water. We passed this spot six hours ago It may have been one of the spots we tried on the way out with no luck. We pulled the fish to the boat, nothing was following him, so we brought him onboard.
I checked the GPS and knew exactly where we caught that fish. We moved the baits closer still behind the boat. We made three of four more passes over the same spot and caught two more mahi mahis. We were only about five miles from shore. It’s funny how that works. I truly believe you can’t give up when you’re fishing. And you always have to be ready for surprises.
Once again, the EP-2 brought home the bacon. Richard and I had a great time and wound up with some fabulous fresh fish filets. And life is good in the Florida Keys; life is very good in the Florida Keys.
C.J. Geotis is a life-long fisherman who followed his dream more than 20 years ago to live in the Florida Keys. His books, “Florida Keys Fish Stories,” and “Double-Edged Sword” are available at Amazon.com. He lives in Marathon with his wife, Loretta, and her Coca-Cola collection. His email is fishstoriescj@comcast.net.