Three Days with Buffalo Burgers – Orange Beach, Gulf Shores 5-3-2012

May 20, 2012 in Alabama, Deep Sea Fishing, Dolphin, Fishing Report, Grouper, Gulf Shores, Orange Beach, Sportsman Marina, Tuna, Wahoo

Three day fishing trips aren’t the normal overnight trip if all you want is just Tuna Fish and maybe some Dolphin (Mahi-Mahi).  With only six anglers on board we headed out on a Thursday afternoon for a three night, three day trip. It’s not normal to leave that early in the afternoon and then run all night, but when you have three days to do it in, you just don’t need to get in a hurry. We left Orange Beach from Sportsman Marina around four pm and headed south around 10 knots. The seas were between 3-5 ft. with an occasional 4-6 ft. coming out of the south east with a 15-20 knot wind. I know it sounds bad and it was but this was actually better conditions than what they said it was going to be. For the first five miles or so out of the pass it was pretty rough and then it spread out and got a little smaller which made the ride tolerable but not comfortable at all. We just knuckled down and dug in for a slow ride and before you knew it we found ourselves in the dark and the boat wasn’t rocking near as much, Thank the Lord. That was pretty much the worst of the whole trip and it was behind us now. It got nicer and nicer for the next two days till it was as slick as a mill pond with hardly a breeze of air.

We traveled out at night for around eight hour s till we came to one of the offshore rigs that usually hold good fish so we stopped and checked it for some sign of life by Jigging for Tuna under the lights. The rig didn’t show much on the fish finder but we tried it any way and ended up catching one Black Fin Tuna. So, we headed on to the next one further out about 15 miles. Now it’s around 3 am in the morning and everyone is unconscious, except me. Once we got some coffee in us, it was game on! First line out, “Fish On!”  We ended up catching a couple of huge Yellow Fin Tuna on live bait and chunk fishing. The fish bit all day pretty steady, our problem was keeping a fresh and lively angler on the business end of the rod, seems that the ride out and the long hours of the night took its toll on the crew. One of the best parts of these trips is the meals on the Big Green Egg. These guys have some buffalo Hamburger and I’d never tried any before. “Delicious!”  Being the red meat guy that I am, that was awesome, not to mention the Prime Sirloin another fellow brought from Brazil like they serve at “Fogo de Chao” original restaurants. We ate like kings for three days. Sausage on the grill for breakfast, Buffalo burgers for lunch, rib-eye steaks for dinner, and like a good deckhand does, we had some cookies and cream ice cream for desert that he brought just to make sure we had all of the comforts of home, you know!

We wrapped up our trip with some 4-5 lb Mingo’s and a limit of 40-50 lb Amberjack to go along with a box full of Yellow Fin Tuna, Black Fin Tuna, Skip Jack Tuna and a couple of Wahoo in the 40-50 lb range. Yes, we did catch some huge Gag Grouper which do not open until July 1rst. and we properly ventilated  and released them after taking some great pictures. It turned out to be a great trip for everyone, even the couple of guys that didn’t see daylight for about 36 hours. They have already booked a trip in the fall for another overnight Tuna trip.

Party Boat Fishing in Orange Beach, Gulf Shores and Perdido Key

April 19, 2012 in Alabama, Fishing Report, Gulf Shores, Mingo, Orange Beach, Perdido Pass, Tuna, Wahoo, Walk-on Fishing

Party Boat Fishing in Orange Beach and Gulf Shores on the Emerald Spirit.

Today we had a six hour party boat walk-on trip. The weather was a little over cast this morning with a good breeze out of the north, along with a 2-3 ft. swell out of the south southeast.  We left at our usual time of departure at 8:00 a.m. and went out to the area we fish around 20 miles on the natural bottom or rocks of coral. On our way we noticed that there was a lot of the sargasso grass on the beach and in the water. Some of it made up real nice grass lines which hold bait and then draws in other fish like dolphin, Wahoo, tuna, king mackerel and other top water fish. Wouldn’t you know it didn’t take long and there were reports from other fishermen that they had caught some black fin tuna on the weed lines while trolling out to their fishing holes.  We didn’t seem to get a line out to troll, but we did get a drift line out when we stopped to fish. The mingo’s and white snapper were biting real well. After fishing a couple of places and moving around we got a big bite on the drift line and a big fish on a two hook rig at the same time. Not knowing what either fish were till the one on the two hook rig popped up did we know we had two black fin tuna on at once. I guess you could say the fellow with the two hook rig applied too much pressure and lost that one but we did manage to get the other one in the boat. As Murphy’s Law would have it the same fellow who lost the first one, hooked a second one before they got the one on the spinning rod in and he lost the second fish he hooked as well. It was pretty exiting the for several minutes to say the very least, one person going around the boat with a spinning rod and another in the back hooking up and losing them faster than you could tell what was going on. Nevertheless, we are grateful to get the one we did. Now I can’t wait till tomorrow, we’ll be ready.

Tuna Fishing Overnight Trip

May 13, 2011 in Action Charter Service, Fish, Fishing Report, Gulf Shores, Orange Beach, Tuna

Well they say a picture is worth a thousand words and if that’s the case then this one speaks volumes. We left out on Saturday morning with a live well full of pin fish, Cigar minnows, Croakers, Hard tails and some menhaden. Our first stop was as usual for some other kinds of offshore bait like small White snapper and Small Vermillion snapper. After getting the live well so full that you can’t see into it but about 6” we went on out to try some deep water bottom fishing. From this point on it seemed that we were on a mission that could do no wrong. When we stopped on our first hole the 4 pound Mingo’s (vermillion) Snappers were on fire. Everyone was catching 1 or 2 on each drop using a small piece of squid on a two hook rig. However, the best thing was that for every 5 or 6 Mingo’s we were getting a nice 6-8 pound Scamp on a live pinfish or croaker. Unbelievable, could it get any better than this? We did this on every hole we stopped on all the way out to my secret Amberjack hole. As we approached the AJ hole my guys rigged up quickly for the battle that was fixing to happen. They cleared the deck of the two hook rigs on the Electric reels and got out the heavy lined 6/0 reels. Once we pulled up into position and I gave the command, it only took 45 minutes to get our two day bag limit of the 35 to 60 pound Amberjacks. We never missed a beat. As everyone were high fiving each other I headed on out around 4:00 p.m. to the offshore deepwater oilrigs for some tuna fishing action.

We arrived with anticipation and excitement of what was to happen next. It certainly didn’t disappoint. As soon as the lines were in the water we were on. A small Black Fin Tuna and then another, and then another and another. After a few laps around the rig we saw what we came for, the Big Yellow Fin Tuna busting the water on top just out from the rig a little and heading right to us. As the tension built up we crossed over the school of fish and all eyes were on the lines. “Fish On, right rigger!” then “Fish on Left rigger!” OH Yea! They were biting! We fished into the night, jigging next to the rigs as the seas built to 6-8 feet. We got up the next morning around 3:30 a.m. and started it all over again. Before it was over we had 4 Yellow Fin Tuna, 25 Black Fin Tuna, over 40 head of Scamp, around 180 head of Jumbo Mingo’s and 24 Amberjacks Totaling a little over 2,000 lbs. Wow!

Fish, Weather and Anglers’ Excitement Are Warming Up

May 12, 2008 in Action Charter Service, Alabama, Fishing Report, Gulf of Mexico, Salt Water Series Tournament, World Championship Red Snapper Tournament

Fishing out of Orange Beach Alabama is building to an all time great high.

Red Snapper are more abundant than ever before and there has been a few 90 plus pound Wahoo brought to the weigh in scales for the Salt Water Series Tournament. We have seen some big Amberjack being caught in the 35-45 pound range as well as some 50-75 pound Yellow Fin Tuna. The Black Fin Tuna are biting well also.

On our last few offshore trips we have been bringing in some Scamp in the 15-18 pound range as well as some 4.5lb Vermilion Snapper (Mingo). Trigger Fish are making a good show along with big White Snapper in the 3.5lb range.

The Inshore action is doing well with the Cobia showing up, some weighed in at 90.3 lb, 86.5 and more. Spanish, King mackerel and Red Fish are biting along the beach. There are plenty of Cigar Minnows starting to bunch up in schools on the bottom.

So far we’ve seen an improvement in every species and it looks like we’ll see even more in the future. The weather is warming up every day and is expected to reach as high as 90 degrees today. We are all looking forward to the opening of Federal Waters for Red Snapper on June 1st. The season will be open until August 5th. There will be the “World Championship Red Snapper Tournament” going on the entire season for Red Snapper. Check out our web page and the photo gallery for pictures of some “Big” Red Snapper and Call or E-mail us for a chance to win $25,000.00 in the Tournament.

Good Weather and Good Fishing

May 8, 2008 in Action Charter Service, Fishing Report, World Championship Red Snapper Tournament

Once again we enter the fishing season with some good weather and the fishing has been great. We’ve reported to you on the start of the season and how it looked like it might be a sign of better things to come and so far it hasn’t let us down. The offshore action is picking up trolling out around the rigs like the Marlin, Beer Can, Patronius, and even the Ram Powell. Some 60lb.

Yellow Fin Tuna and small Black fin Tuna have been caught on each but are still moving around from rig to rig depending on the current and wind direction. Most are being caught trolling with small Ballyhoo and soft head lures wile there have been a few caught with live bait on a kite or chunk fishing. The other day one of my buddies told me that as he was trolling by one of the rigs early in the morning the Rainbow Runners suddenly showered out of the water toward the rig.

This could only mean one thing; the man in “Blue” was after them. He knew there was a Blue Marlin chasing the school for a morning snack. “They’re here”.

As for the bottom fishing, it hasn’t slowed down at all. If any thing it’s gotten even better due to the water temperature rising and the bait fish showing up more. The Red Snapper are bigger and more plentiful than ever before for as far back as I can remember and I’ve been here for 48 years in this Gulf Coast area. Thanks to the efforts of the National Marine Fisheries we now have so many fish that if they don’t let us have back our fish limits and Total Allowable Catch you can look forward to seeing swimmers being eaten alive like Piranha from the Red Snappers. Yet still they say that the Fish Stock hasn’t rebuilt itself from “Over Fishing”.

The Wahoo and King Mackerel are biting good trolling. We use a #2 Plainer with a 3-4 inch Drone spoon either plain silver, Hot Pink or Chartreuse. It depends on the clarity of the water that day and how much sun light there is. When we troll for Wahoo we use a pair of 9/0 Penn reels with wire line on a Bent Butt Deep Drop rod. Then we put a 16oz. to 48oz. trolling weight in front of a lure that is around 24oz.

Sometimes we change that up a little and use a soft head in front and over the top of a skirt with an 8oz. lead in the head for a different effect at a slower speed. Generally we troll between 13 and 18 knots. This is why we use all of the heavy line and weights, to get the lure down far enough for the fish to see it. Let me tell ya, “It Works!” We troll out to our fishing holes in the morning and then between spots and back home again every day.

The Scamp and Grouper bite is still going strong as is the Magnum B-Liners (Vermillion) or (Mingo). Some of the Scamp as big as 18lbs.and the Mingo’s as big as 5.5lbs. The Scamp are biting small Pinfish and Squid and the Mingo’s on Squid. The Trigger Fish are showing up as well in good numbers.

All in all you can’t ask for it to get any better that that. We are all looking forward to the Federal opening of Snapper Season on June 1st. That is when the “World Championship Red Snapper Tournament” starts. There will be a First Place Prize of $25,000.00 and it pays out thru 10 places, Tenth place being $1,000.00. I can’t wait. We’ve always placed in the top ten coming close to the big money, but not yet. Maybe next time. Call us and let us take you out for a chance to win.