Team Ticklestick headed down to Marathon for our first mini season. We stayed in Key Colony which was a great place! Will definately be back there next summer. We started off Sunday evening by doing some reef fishing on Jackie Leigh. We caught a couple of yellowtail snapper and some other small snappers and grunts. We just used some frozen sardines and frozen shrimp.No fish pictures as everything was pretty small. Current was basically nonexistent on the reef. We headed back after sunset to do some dock light fishing. We saw a few tarpon but no luck on getting them to bite. We saw several lobster crawling on the grass flats leading us to believe bullynetting is not a bad idea!

It was like deja vu but me, the old man, Matt and Joyce headed out bright and early. We were determined to fight through the bonita for a summer sail however there were huge mats of weeds in 250' out so we couldn't pass that up. Within a few minutes of being out there we hooked a couple of keep dolphin. Just barely keepers at about 21" but since it was my old man's first dolphin we kept them for dinner. We did see a sailfish freejumpin in 400' but could not get him to bite. Seas were a little sloppy to start the day but got dead flat as the morning went on. We fished until about 11am then headed in to call it a day. All in all we ended up with 5 mahi and a 15lb skipjack that mean some Ahi Tuna! Caught the skipjack on a freelined ballyhoo. Caught the dolphin on anything that we through. Water was much clearer today with the SE winds overnight.

Me, the old man, Matt and Carrie hit the water at sunrise in search of a summer sail but we mostly found bonita and more bonita. By 8am we had hooked several, one of which was torn to pieces by a Barracuda. Matt also landed a monster bull shark. We then headed offshore in search of weeds and dolphin. We found several nice patches that held lots of little dolphin. Each patch of weeds produced a few small peanuts then we would move on to the next patch. All in all it was a good day and we headed in to beat the heat. Current was pretty much non existent until we got to the gulfstream which was about 7 miles out. We caught several mahi on topwater, dead bait, and live bait caught on the sabiki. Got some good GoPro footage of the bullshark. Click here for the video. Matts Bull Shark 7-19-2014

Jed, Doug, me and Andrew headed out to try to avoid the bonita. We caught a few of them within minutes of having a line in then decided to head offshore when the bull sharks made another appearance. We ran offshore about 8 miles and started picking up some weeds so we searched and searched until we found the mother load in 800'. We picked up a bunch of little peanuts just under sized. Didn't take any pictures as we were in hot pursuit of trying to get a few bigger fish. The weeds were massive and had a ton of bait under them. The dolphin were eating almost everything we threw at them including live bait that we were catching under the weeds. It rained from 630am until 830am when we finally decided to just head towards the inlet and luckily it ended up being a perfect day and was very calm! No fishing on Sunday this week as Carrie and I headed to Key Largo to do some snorkeling since we could not snorkel with the bull sharks being a menace.

SHARKS! Bull sharks everywhere. Bonita everywhere. Was really a challenge to find weeds this weekend and there were no cobia around the bull sharks surprisingly. Still had a fun day on the water with Carrie, Matt and Joyce. Managed to catch a Kingfish that we let get away after Matt tried to gaff his first fish. We had a few bite offs from the sharks and maybe a king or two but overall we could have caught 100 bonita but gave up after a handful. The sailfish snacks that Matt brought didn't do the trick but its bound to happen soon just from pure luck!

Carrie, Matt and I took out my Uncle Paul (aka Elder Biscuit) for an early morning trip in search for Paul's first ever Mahi. Within a few minutes of dropping a line in around a weedline, we had a small peanut hooked. We ended up catching about 20 small dolphin throughout the day but the big prize of the day was the 26lb Bull Dolphin that we hooked straight out of the inlet in 430' of water. Carrie had hooked up with a big dolphin but it spit the hook so she reeled in quickly and pitched the bait back out to the fish. Sure enough within seconds we had another monster back on the line. She passed the rod over to Elder Biscuit and the fight was on. While battling the dolphin we had numerous boats come over trying to mooch off our area but we were the only ones with an success, at least in that area. They were all trolling and we were pitching dead and cut bait at them. We even had several hooked on Rapala skitterwalk top water lures. Below are some pictures from the day. Conditions were fairly calm with winds picking up from the N/NE (a far cry from the ESE winds NOAA was calling for) as the day went on. Water temps were about 85 and the current was very strong. We also had the looming tropical mischief (future Hurricane Arthur) off the coast but was not yet affecting our weather. Weedlines were very numerous but there were a lot of scattered weeds making it less desirable to troll!

After 2 afternoon trips on Friday and Saturday, Carrie, Jed, Jillian and me headed out around 730am to see if we could have better luck and avoid the bonita's in the morning. Well, we didn't avoid them in fact i think we caught more. We tried looking for dolphin first thing but no luck so we headed in to 100' and within 30 seconds of having a line in we had a bonita hooked. Since it was slow offshore we played with the bobo's and had fun. We did manage a 15lb Amberjack and a 15lb Kingfish which were both good fights on light tackle. Then we headed in to snorkel by Breakers to cap off a fantastic weekend of boating and fishing. Other than not catching a targeted species I could not ask for anything more for a weekend! Conditions on Sunday were choppier than predicted (surprise surprise). Winds were NW and actually somewhat strong. Bluewater started in about 300' and there were a lot of weed patches but they were small. They all held quite a bit of bait but no fish. Here are some pics from the day.

Doug, Andrew, Michael and me headed out after the storms swept through in the afternoon in search of some dolphin and maybe some snapper. It was Michael's first time offshore fishing so we wanted to get him something good. We ran down to breakers to try to snag some blue runners but didn't have any luck. We headed offshore to about 500' and found lots of scattered weeds but nothing that looked like it would hold fish so we headed in closer to shore to see what would bite. Of course it was Bonita Bonita Bonita but still fun especially since we had a first timer. After a long drift and bonita after bonita we headed up to the inlet and drifted north. Not long after Doug hooked a monster Hammerhead on a cut bonita fillet. After 45 minutes we finally got it up to the boat before releasing him! Wind was strong out of the south but waves were not too bad. Probably 2' with an occasional 3' set. Here is a quick video we put together of the shark battle. http://youtu.be/EsDibWFthgU

Headed out on the Blue Heron Drift Boat with LDS for a Friday afternoon fishing adventure. Grunts, snapper and Bonita were pretty much the most prevalent species. They set up drift in 80' just south of the Juno Pier and another drift in the same area but in 140'. Weeds were scattered and murky water was the rule. Someone did catch a kingfish that was chopped in half by the taxman (Barracuda). Overall pretty slow day but still nice to get out on the water and see how they were doing. Someone caught a Cobia on the morning trip. The crew also used half sardines which we thought was to save money and get smaller fish to bite but towards the end we made them use whole sardines and started to pick up the Bonita.

Carrie and I took out my mom and stepdad who were visiting from Ohio for an early morning fishing trip on Saturday. We were glad to see extremely calm seas and clear skies despite calls for threatening weather. We wanted to make sure we got them at least one fish before the weather turned so we fished off Singer Island in bonitaville but after battling two boneheads in the heat we decided to run offshore in search of Dolphin. We got to about 500' and there was a mess of weeds and boats but then we found the jackpot... a wood pallet. We put several small dolphin in the cooler ranging from 5 to 12lbs on cut bait and top water lures. Then the big bull came to eat one of our dead sardines we had freelined! Carrie battled him for 15 minutes and landed her biggest dolphin ever. We could not believe this pallet hadn't been picked over because it was almost straight out the inlet on a calm day with boats all over but we were glad it wasn't. Great day on the water with family then we headed in to peanut island to cool off.

Matt, me and Carrie hit the water around 845am after waiting for the early morning rain to clear. Once it cleared it turned out to be a beautiful day! After playing around with Bonita all morning we headed offshore in search for weeds. Despite being scattered the day before, there turned out to be massive weedlines and patches in 600' off of Jupiter Inlet. We found one mat that was holding some small schoolies and we put 3 of the biggest ones we could catch in the cooler. They were biting live bait that we were catching on the sabiki as we were catching the dolphin, lures, frozen ballyhoo and dead sardines. Matt actually hooked a dolphin on the sabiki and boated it! Carrie was slaying the dolphin on almost every cast! We saw one Sail free jumping on another weed patch but could not get him to bite. Great day on the water!

Thomas, Andrew, Dana and me hit the water at sunrise set out for dolphin, wahoo or Sailfish! We bought live bait from Target Live Bait by Sailfish Marina and then hit the water. After a few run ins with Bonita and a big Mutton Snapper we landed a 25lb Kingfish on a dead sardine. We had bought goggle eyes from Target Live Bait but all we had to show for it was bite offs and bonitas.