Lanark 06/17/11 -- Sharks, Sharks, and More Sharks
Posted: June 20th, 2011, 1:33 pm
After Ranaman took me out of Carrabelle and put me on my first red snapper and a few fun red grouper, I talked my buddy Sharkman into braving an offshore trip out of Lanark aboard Marine's Dream. The past few years we've strictly targeted cobia & redfish out of St. Marks & Econ, so we made a New Years resolution in 2011 that we would take at least one or two trips out of other ports to see what else the Big Bend area has to offer. I also shared Woopty's concern that as we never fish tournaments but have regular luck with the cobes, that we didn't want to haul in a winner and kick ourselves for not entering the Saltwater Classic tourney! 
We met as the sun was rising and loaded up with bait. Our general game plan was to aim towards K tower and check the grounds between it and O tower. Versus targeting public numbers we thought we would do our own search for unpublished spots.
Long story made short, maybe we should have targeted the actual towers and artificial reefs in the area as what we caught while we drifted around in waters between 50 and 75' was sharks, sharks, and more sharks. Quit counting at the double digit mark. Can't say we didn't have any quality catches as we also caught countless keeper seabass. But as we were hoping for red grouper & snapper we didn't put the seabass on ice and instead released them to be caught another day. Also caught a single triggerfish early on and released it too... in hindsight wish we had kept it!
Most fun catch of the day was actually a bonita hooked by Paul on our initial run out to deep water. Spotted a school and Paul quickly snagged one with a topwater lure.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NzjTbLkQg9M[/video]
Entire rest of the day we saw bonita feeding everywhere and in hindsight wish we had traded the shark catches off the bottom for more fast-paced bonita topwater catches.
Ready to get back on the cobes again now, but also looking forward to future trips out of the Lanark / Carrabelle area as it's quite a bit different fishery than we expected and provided a whole new area to attempt to learn.
We met as the sun was rising and loaded up with bait. Our general game plan was to aim towards K tower and check the grounds between it and O tower. Versus targeting public numbers we thought we would do our own search for unpublished spots.
Long story made short, maybe we should have targeted the actual towers and artificial reefs in the area as what we caught while we drifted around in waters between 50 and 75' was sharks, sharks, and more sharks. Quit counting at the double digit mark. Can't say we didn't have any quality catches as we also caught countless keeper seabass. But as we were hoping for red grouper & snapper we didn't put the seabass on ice and instead released them to be caught another day. Also caught a single triggerfish early on and released it too... in hindsight wish we had kept it!
Most fun catch of the day was actually a bonita hooked by Paul on our initial run out to deep water. Spotted a school and Paul quickly snagged one with a topwater lure.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NzjTbLkQg9M[/video]
Entire rest of the day we saw bonita feeding everywhere and in hindsight wish we had traded the shark catches off the bottom for more fast-paced bonita topwater catches.
Ready to get back on the cobes again now, but also looking forward to future trips out of the Lanark / Carrabelle area as it's quite a bit different fishery than we expected and provided a whole new area to attempt to learn.