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Casey & I left the dock at 0900 hours aboard our boat, the Bare Necessities, headed offshore to Seahorse Reef with the goal of playing with Spanish mackerel and pulling our stone crab traps since the season just closed. The ride out was a bit choppy and once near the reef we began setting up for trolling when Casey stated he wasn’t feeling the best. Four rods out and trolling commences. It didn’t take long for him to feel better as his mind changed from the rocking seas to catching fish. Trolling four small rods we had to drop down to three rods as we were getting simultaneous quadruple hits with bluefish, ladyfish, and blue runners. That was a lot of fun and it was quite humorous but it became a bit too much trouble working through crossed lines with fish on them. After a bit three rods got to be too much too so we dropped down to only two rods out. We caught tons of bluefish, keeping a bakers dozen for the smoker and releasing many more.

Casey with a typical bluefish

We trolled for 1:40 minutes and had a lot of fun as we both pulled in fish after fish. These numerous small striking fish were good teaching tools for Casey as he got a lot of practice setting out multiple lines and managing fish to the boat with other lines waiting to be cleared of fish. Oddly enough we only caught two small Spanish while trolling.

Having our fill of fast action we headed over the Steel Tower to see about a cobia but no one was home. With that we headed the boat to the west into the choppy seas and toward a grouper number not too far away just shy of 40 feet. Once there the fish were hungry and very cooperative. The bite was on and Casey was ecstatic after boating his 5th legal grouper.


A short & a keeper for Casey


Hooked up and ……………..


Casey with a nice stocky gag

After his fifth keeper he took a break so with 10 in the box I took advantage of a fun bite. A few more legal gag were caught to 27+” with them all being released.


27 incher about to be released

While there we noticed a turtle surfacing and about a minute later two cobia swam up to the boat. As they milled around the transom a live bait was dropped, which promptly sounded with two cobia hot on its tail. With one of the cobia hooked up I tried enticing the other to eat with a jig and squid but it wasn’t to be. Since it wasn’t an obvious legal 33 incher we got the cobia tagging kit ready and then netted it. Casey’s cobia went 32” at the fork and we promptly tagged it. Casey took a couple of photos and then we revived it a bit and then released it. With a surge it broke my grip and swam off none for the worse.


Casey’s 32” tagged cobia


Off you go

Low & high tide was 0647 hrs (1.4 ft) and 1324 hrs (3.9 ft), respectively. Inshore the water temperature was 77.1 ° F and offshore it was 76.4° F. There wasn’t much surface grass so trolling wasn’t a problem on the reef. Grouper were caught on dead bait with only two shorts caught brought into the boat. The water clarity where we were wasn’t that good as we couldn’t see bottom.

We were back at the dock a bit before 1500 hours bringing home ten gag to 11.2 lbs and 13 bluefish for the smoker. We had a great father & son day on the water and our upcoming Memorial Day weekend with friends will be featuring marinated fish sandwiches & smoked blues.

Hoo Yah!!
Brian

I don't see how it could have been much better Good job all around

Sweet trip BBB Enjoyed the read and pics. Bringing Casey up right

Great report!

Great report Brian.

nice fish...looks like the old man can put the boys on some fish

Great trip, nice fish. Sounds like ya'll had a good time.

Wow, that sounded like fun.i am new to fishing keaton and are curious;how far out is seahorse reef?i would love to play out there but have to work up some confidence in the old boat. Thanks, Bob

I love to read your reports Brian, Casey is a young man of the sea.

Great trip!

Good reading, good pics, sounds/looks like good times... congrats to Casey!