Deep Sea Fishing 411

Like Forrests’ Mother always said, “Life is like a box of chocolates, you just never know what you’re gonna get.”  Well, it applies to fishing just as well as life.  In fact, I think going fishing is a good comparison to life.  It teaches patience, acceptance, and sportmanship.  You learn as you go…  there’s no “fishing school” to go to, it all comes down to experience and most important of all, it teaches teamwork and that learned early in life will make life easier in the long run.  Of course, this is all just my opinion, but I’ve had thousands of hours to watch baits and think about it

Anyway, the Sailfish have been plentiful lately.  Even when we really didn’t want to catch them!  For example, Wells Richards brought “Team Richards” down to fish the annual Gator Dolphin Tournament where the prizes go to the largest Dolphin (Mahi Mahi) caught.   Well, both days we caught Sailfish and then Dolphin too.  We had several Dolphin in the 20 pound range and one close to thirty.  We didn’t win any prizes, but we weighed fish every day and were always in position to make a move to the top of the leader board with a little bit of luck!

Thanks Wells, and we hope to see you again next year!!

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Check out the video here on Miami Herald's website about Bud N' Mary's trying to stay afloat in these tough economic times!

http://www.miamiherald.com/video/index.html?media_id=4774255

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Today we had Dwayne, Allan, Paul, Simon and Dean from Jamacia out with us.

We had a great time today - we went trolling over the reef and caught king mackeral - the porpoises were around and made catching a real thrill - trying to get the kings in before the porpoises got them.

The fishing has been really good here lately and the weather has been great early in the day -

Contact Capt. Mark at (954) 728-9880

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Today we had Mary Ann Martin (Roland Martin's ex-wife) and her daughter, and sister and family out with us.

Well, Mary Ann wanted to catch dolphin. So out we went, we trolled all over the ocean and managed to find one dolphin and one tuna.

We wanted to make sure she had plenty of fish for a great family dinner, so we headed out to the deep and caught a bunch of rosies. Well, after a meal of rosies - Mary Ann has given up on dolphin!!!

Fishing has been a wide variety these days - one great thing is if one thing isn't working - we can always find something else!!

Contact Capt. Mark at (954) 728-9880

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Today we had Mike and Gino from the Southeast Florida Chamber of Commerce out with us.

We headed out on the reef and the bite was really slow this afternoon, so we all decided to head out to the deep and do some drops for blackbelly rosies and golden tile.

This turned out to be the right move - we caught 2 really nice goldens and some rosies.

What a great time fishing with these guys.

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Figuring that we put about 1,200 hours a year on the boat, engines, and generator, it comes as no surprise that occasionally, we have to replace something very big and expensive.  This week, it was the generator or as we call it (for some reason nautical) the genset.  The generator is a diesel powered motor that runs the entire trip at a constant RPM and turns a big wire winding that creates electricity.  It basically powers everything from lights to stoves, micro-wave, bilge pumps, live-well pumps and, the big one…  Air Conditioning!

A lot of our trips are booked because the charter expects A/C.  Now, certainly A/C doesn’t affect whether the fish bite or not, but it definitely makes a fishing charter in June more “civilized.”  There’s nothing like standing on the back deck of the “Mr. Z” waiting for a strike feeling more like a bug under a magnifying glass, then being able to duck into the cabin for just a moment and inhale some of that 70 degree air that pumps out steadily from the 3, count ‘em, 3 Cruise-Aire made air-conditioners

I don’t quite get the advantage since the majority of my time is spent up on the bridge (albeit with some breeze coming over the bow) but on a slow fishing day, having the crew be able to relax in the cabin on the 6 person couch with the A/C on will certainly make my job a bit less stressful. 

I had the unpleasant experience of informing a couple of our charters last week that the gen-set was down and that the A/C wouldn’t be working for their charter and surprisingly, I got very little grief for it!  Most people (especially ones that have owned boats before) will relate to something not working as planned and that we do the best we can to adapt.  Besides, it’s a fishing trip where part of the fun is enjoying the great out of doors.  At least that was a big part of my sales pitch!

So, within 3 days, Capt. Steve had ordered a new generator ($10K in case you are interested) removed the old one (480 lbs. in case you were interested) and had the new one installed and blowing cold air for our customers. There were some heated moments along the way and nothing ever seems to go as planned, but we do plan on keeping this one for as long  as possible and making a lot of people comfortable while waiting for the big one to strike.

 A huge “Thank You” goes out from me to Capt. Steve for getting it done and in a timely fashion (not the norm in Key West)  I couldn’t have done it without him!

——–

And you just thought he caught fish! 

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Today we had Rick and his family from Colorado out with us. The fishing was a little slower this afternoon, but we did catch some bonitos and king mackeral. This weather patter should change by the first part of the week and the fishing action should pick back up.

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Summer is here and the weather is getting hot.  The action on the reef is heating up too as the big schools of bonitos and kingfish make their way down the edge of the gulfstream.  Our daily drift fishing trips have been getting some awesome catches of kingfish and bonitos lately.  When a school of bonitos swims anywhere near the boat, every line we have in the water gets bit.  It can be pretty exciting at times.  Mixed in with these bonito schools are kingfish and the occassional tuna and/or wahoo. 

Sportfishing trips have been very good lately too. On our longer trips, 6 hours or more, we’ve been trolling offshore for mahi-mahi.  June is the best month of the year for finding schools of mahi-mahi offshore along weedlines.  The dolphins have been mostly peanuts, but the numbers of them have been great.  One good school of fish can fill the box and max out your daily limit of 10 per person.  This time of year also, you have the outside chance at a blue marlin, the grand prize fish of the entire ocean.  Unfortunately, we don’t catch them very often, but this is the time of year you will see a few caught out there.  If we caught them all the time, they wouldn’t be such a prized fish.

Our half day sportfishing trips have been fishing the reef, where there has been realy good action on bonito and kingfish.  Trolling the reef can also catch you the occassional wahoo, tuna or even sailfish this time of year.  Wreck fishing on the shallow and deep wrecks has been good for barracuda, amberjack and an occassional cobia.  We’ve even been getting some big mutton snappers lately during the day trips.

The night fishing on our night anchor trips has been great for action and probably our best trip for catching the most fish overall.  On our night trips, we target snappers and the snapper fishing has been awesome.  Yellowtails are biting pretty regular.  The muttons are beginning to show up for the mutton spawn and are being caught more and more on our trips lately.  Mangroves are biting great too and have been really big ones.  All in all the night trips have been great.  Great fishing this month and it should get better and better until the end of August.  Sea you on the water. 

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June/July 2009 Double Issue of Outdoor Life magazine (http://www.outdoorlife.com) features Bud N' Mary's!  You can read the issue here, you may need to zoom in to 200% to read it. You should see a little 100% in the bottom right corner of your browser, click and change to 200%.

Outdoor Life Cover

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Swordfishing article featured in the June 2009 edition of In The Bite Magazine.  (http://www.inthebite.com)

Also check out the video featuring Capt. Nick Stanczyk of the BnM showcasing their swordfish rig!

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