OU Wins Hawks Nest Billfish Blast in Cat Island, Bahamas!!
The following report is based on Captain Joe's audio reports during the Hawks Nest Billfish Tournament in Cat Island that just ended today.
Friday, May 8 - The Low Profile is currently fishing the Hawks Nest Billfish Blast down in Cat Island. Today we're sitting in 3rd place with still one more day of fishing to go. Most boats fished on Thursday where we decided to take a lay day so if tomorrow is good we could find ourselves in first place. Yesterday there were two blue marlin caught and two white marlin today. There are plenty of dolphin and we are catching a bunch of them and releasing most of them. First place dolphin weighed in at 40 lbs...ours came in at 39.4lb so we just missed it on that class. We fished the western side of Devils Point as everyone else fished Columbus Point. We're pretty happy with where we're at as most people have to lay tomorrow. 1st place was with 300 pts with one blue marlin, 2nd place 300 pts and 3rd place at 150 pts.
Saturday, May 9 - Day 3 of the Hawks Nest Billfish Blast. This is our 2nd day fishing the tournament. There have only been seven billfish caught in the 1st three days. Fishing has been slow this morning. At 1:15 we hooked into one blue marlin and caught him. This pushed us up into 1st place. We were fishing the Dolphin Head off of Cat Island. At 3:10pm we caught a sailfish. We feel we've been doing pretty good given that the fishing around the full moon is a challenge. We saw three, caught three in the last two days. We are currently sitting in 1st place so we're very happy. The lure of choice have been the purple/black Rick's Fancy which we have been using for the past 6-7 years. You can find it online at our store www.ousupply.com. If you're fishing in the Bahamas you definitely should get a couple. We're fishing tomorrow and hopefully we'll be cashing in!
Sunday, May 10 - LOW PROFILE wins the tournament!! Congratulations to the "A" Team Captains Joe Trainor and Thomas Neligon!!! Way to go guys!
pictured to the right - Rick's Fancy - Great Billfish Lure
Islamorada Fishing Report
This week was full of life. The Dolphin have started to move in closer to the reef edge, close to 300 feet of water. The Gulf Stream has pushed way in due to all the east wind we have been getting over the last couple of weeks. The water is a beautiful blue and just a trickle of current running to the north east. The water temps are in the mid to upper 70’s and the visibility is about 100’.We mostly fished for the Dolphins this week; had plenty of schoolie’s and several nice 25lb’s plus. We have to do a lot of sight fishing and if we get real lucky we sometimes find a nice floater, which is usually loaded with Wahoo and Dolphin this time of the year. Not much grass yet just a few trickle lines here and there. We just troll two baits while searching for the birds. Once we find them we like to point towards the SW and usually they will follow us. The later part of the week we were able to anchor down and be real productive on the reef. The yellowtails are eating very well. We had our limit in two hours today which was around 90 fish at an average size of 2 to 3 lbs. We have also been finding some nice Black Groupers along with a steady bite of Mutton Snappers.
On a final note my brother Jeff has had some pretty great happenings this week. First, Captain Jeff will now be working with OUA year round down here in the Keys. Mostly skiff and center console.trips. He has been doing very well with the Tarpon and the Shark fishing is getting real good with Black Tips, Hammerheads and Bull sharks. And lastly he got married yesterday. Oh Boy, Jennifer is her name and she is a great person so best of luck to both of you from all of us here at OUA!
Capt.John Oughton - THAT'S RIGHT
cell 305-481-6527
Boat Raft-up Party at the Sandbar & Full Moon Party !
If you're ever in Islamorada on a weekend we can take you to the Sandbar for a great boat party! And every full moon the Morada Bay in Islamorada hosts a great full moon party which includes three bands (one of them is a Junkanoo Band), fire dancers, fireworks and lots of dancing! Plan your next Keys trip around the full moon!
Audio Fishing Reports
New Updates for Bahamas and Florida Keys Fishing! Take a listen to this week's reports and listen first hand what's biting!
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