March 21, 2016 Report

What a brutal day this trip was. Today I was fishing aboard me friend and client David's 32 foot Intrepid. What a machine! So far every time we have fished on this boat we have landed tarpon but today conditions were definitely tough. With a hard northwest wind blowing 20-25 miles an hour and gusting higher we fished a number of different locations with little success so after 4 hours we called it a day, licked our wounds and headed back to the marina. Capt. Mo Estevez www.MiamiBoneFishing.com 786-853-1409 Follow me on Instagram @MiamiBoneFishing

March 19, 2016 Report

Local transplant John and his cousin from SC Lou boarded this morning for a full day on the water.   John's been living in South Florida for 6 months now and hadn't seen Miami from the water so it was a great experience for him.   Tarpon fishing remained slow with zero fish in spot one and a few in spot two and with increasing winds and rough conditions we headed for the refuge of the shallows.  Using artificial lures they caught a bunch of trout with Lou catching the biggest of the day.   We decided to cut the trip short due to the high winds and dirty water that had slowed fishing.  But,  it's Miami and you never know what will happen next.   As we fished the port of Miami we witnessed a fire rescue boat save someone in the water that was drifting out to sea and with the strong tide,  rough surf and high boat traffic it didn't look good for the person!  

Capt. Mo Estevez  www.MiamiBoneFishing.com  786-853-1409 Follow me on Instagram @MiamiBoneFishing

March 17, 2016 Report

Dave is an avocado farmer from California and a great day. On our half day trip today we searched for tarpon and finding quite a few threw flies, shrimp, crabs and lures at them to no avail. Not wanting to waste time on picky fish we fished deeper with jigs and Dave caught an aquariums worth of species including grouper, snapper, trigger fish, big hog fish, big jack crevalle and a grunt. Using the live grunt as bait for spinner sharks we had one come up twice to it but not eat it. What? A few drifts and marking them on the machine I decided to use the 7lb jack Dave caught as live bait and in no time he was on! Unfortunately we got back the now headless jack but no shark. We kept using the dead jack for bait and it kept getting smaller with eat bite but the sharks would spit the bait before the hook could sink it. On one occasion we got back the chunk of jack after a bite and noticed the bite was 1/4 inch short of the hook. URGH! One of the sharks Dave hooked was about 100lbs and jumped 6 feet in the air 30' from the boat! Dave ended up hooking 7 sharks and landing zero. Lots of action with no releases. See you next year Dave!

Capt. Mo Estevez www.MiamiBoneFishing.com 786-853-1409 Follow me on Instagram @MiamiBoneFishing

March 16, 2016 Report Unbelievable! (Video)

This morning Tom and his son Matt jumped aboard my skiff since they were down on vacation for spring break from New York. Repeating yesterday's game plan we started off with tarpon fishing and Tom hooked a fish that may have very well been a tarpon but ended up breaking off. After catching a number of different species such as two different species of grouper, several species of Snapper and others we used some of the fish we caught as live bait for spinner sharks again. Today was even better than yesterday and we ended up hooking 7 to 9 sharks landing two and watching a number of them free jump and spin 6 feet in the air. Matt was on the rod when one of our live baits got crushed by a shark in front of us hooking up, peeling off line at a blistering pace then spitting the bait.  Another group of sharks moved in within moments and ate the now half dead bait.   This process repeated itself 4 times until finally a big 200 pound bull shark showed up, gobbled it just 15 feet from us and the race was on.  Fifty minutes later Matt released a huge 200 pound bull shark and got quite a workout. Hooking three or four more sharks including a doubleheader we ended the day with Tom hooking up and after a prolonged fight watching his 5-foot spinner shark get eaten next to the boat by a 300-plus pound bull shark. What an amazing sight and what an amazing day!

Capt. Mo Estevez  www.MiamiBoneFishing.com  786-853-1409 Follow me on Instagram @MiamiBoneFishing

March 15, 2016 Report (Video!)

George is a regular client of mine and we fished back on the 2nd and he tore it up so today we wanted a repeat.  We repeated the same game plan as last time but this time we didn't hook a tarpon but that was ok.  After catching a bunch of fish using jigs we began to fish for the big numbers of spinner sharks that were lighting up my Raymarine Fishfinder. It didn't take long for the action to get hot as the rods stayed bent, reels kept screaming and we kept hooking up big shark after big shark after big shark. We ended up hooking 7 and landing one in the hundred thirty pound range. Needing to be back to the marina by 11 a.m. we squeezed every minute we could out of the trip and spend back to the marina.   I love spring in Miami! 

Capt. Mo Estevez  www.MiamiBoneFishing.com  786-853-1409 Follow me on Instagram @MiamiBoneFishing

March 14, 2016 Report

Day two with Mark and his friend and today we had gorgeous conditions,  calm wind, little boat traffic and clean water. The morning started in the search for Tarpon off of South Beach and while we found tons of them they refused to eat. This is getting frustrating! Giving tarpon fishing a good effort we decided to switch gears move out 25 feet and started using jigs that produced a number of bites, several fish and Mark hooking up to some monster that he fought for a while only to have his leader cut off on the bottom. I suspect it may have been a big grouper, Snapper or some other mystery fish that we wish we could have seen. We ended the day catching a few more trout on fly.

Capt. Mo Estevez  www.MiamiBoneFishing.com  786-853-1409 Follow me on Instagram @MiamiBoneFishing

March 13, 2016 AM and PM Reports

AM Report I was looking forward to this charter today because I was fishing with Francisco and his friend Luis. They are both from the Dominican Republic but a few years ago Luis moved to Miami and Francisco comes into town a couple times a year. These guys are absolutely hilarious together and had me in stitches the entire trip. We started off fishing around South Beach where Francisco outfished Luis however to make matters worse Francisco kept rubbing it in. They caught big Hogfish, mutton snapper, mangrove snapper, jack's and missed another bunch of bites from other species. With the wind kicking up and the water getting rougher we decided to head in to shallower water and target sea trout. The first flat was a bit slow but the second spot proved to be the magic one and Francisco picked up another bunch of trout while Luis landed a single trout. Seeing how the day was unfolding Luis was already regretting his unfortunate hand and was getting ready for a week's worth of grilling and teasing by Francisco. These guys were great and they definitely have some great tasting dinner tonight.

PM report  My afternoon trip was with Mark and his friend Matt and conditions could hardly be worse. We had a steady 20 mile-an-hour wind gusting even higher, dirty water, tons of boats and Jet Skis everywhere which relegated us to about 3 fishing spots in the entire Bay to successfully fly fish. Spot one picked up where it left off in my morning trip and Mark caught a few trout on fly. Water started getting dirty so we moved to  a crystal clear flat that had zero Trout on it but a bunch of different manatees grazing on the bottom. The last spot with even higher winds left us with a nice ending to our trip as Matt landed a few trout on artificials and Mark landed a couple of other trout and missed a few more bites. We're scheduled to fish again tomorrow and I look forward to fishing with these guys. Capt. Mo Estevez  www.MiamiBoneFishing.com  786-853-1409 Follow me on Instagram @MiamiBoneFishing