We Win the Pompano Beach Fishing Rodeo

Every year we fish the rodeo with my wife, children and a few friends.  It is a family oriented tournament and everyone usually has a good time.  The field is very competitive and we work very hard to get ready for the two day event. Finally after countless hours of preparation and days of bait fishing we were ready to go. Twenty to twenty-five mile per hour winds and ten foot seas greeted us the first day. Taking our time, we got to the area we wanted to start at and got set up. The day started slow and was very rough! We caught a few keeper kings and saw a big mahi that we didn’t get.  The very next drift we caught a weigher dolphin and things were looking up. Next drift, my daughter Laurel, had a nice fish that was acting like a tuna. After a while we could see Laurel did in fact have a big tuna and that there was a shark trying to get it. I feared the shark would bite the tuna and disqualify our catch. After a few nerve racking moments, the tuna decided to take its fate into its own hands.   Rather than getting eaten by the hungry shark, the tuna decided it would rather jump on the boats engine bracket and dry out! And that is exactly what happened!!!!!!!  Laurel’s tuna leaped on the bracket only to have my thrifty son James standing ready and quickly grabbed the tuna and threw it in the boat. Minutes later James had a big fish on that managed to get wrapped in a competitor's line. I tried desperately to get close to the other boat hoping James would be able to untangle the mess. It was just too rough we couldn’t get close enough and unfortunately the other boat broke their fish off and James was able to land another big tuna that would help us out in the standings! Later in the afternoon we added a couple more tunas that would give us our limit for the day! At the end of day one our team would weigh a limit of kingfish, limit of tuna and a nice dolphin which would be enough for us to be sitting in second place. 

Day two would offer up calmer seas and with a shorter day we would have to fish fast and make our bites count. Right away we caught a couple keeper kings including a nice twenty-five pounder for Laurel. Then we had a big king sky on the left long kite, but got the bait off the hook, before anyone could say a word, the  flatline took off with a big tuna. It was just one of those tournaments where most everything went right and very little went wrong. As my friend Louis says, “When it’s for you…it’s for you. We would finish the second day with another limit of kingfish and two big tunas! After waiting to weigh our fish and coming up with a total of way over three hundred pounds we were declared the WINNERS!!!!!!!!!  It was such an amazing feeling and I was so very proud of my family and my team!  We ended up Top Boat, Top Male Angler, Top Junior Angler and Top Family!!!! A great tournament with my wonderful family!!!!

Max and the Mutton Madness

Lucky Max strikes again and this time he even surprised Greg and I. The weather for the day was a bit questionable so after catching bait we decided to try a spot close to home. As soon as we got the kites up Max hooked and quickly landed a twenty-five pound kingfish. From that moment on we never went more than fifteen minutes without catching a nice fish. After Greg and I reset the kites I dropped a bait to the bottom and the rod bent over instantly! The way the fish was fighting everyone was sure it was a nice bottom fish and a short time later we put a ten pound mutton snapper in the boat for Max. That is the way the entire morning went. Max and his friend Rick were either pulling up mutton after mutton after mutton from the bottom (sometimes double headers) or they were catching nice sized kingfish on the kite. With the weather getting better all the time we decided to stick it out. The afternoon fishing was almost better than the morning if that was even possible. The mutton snappers continued to bite and we even managed to get a few big yellowtails for Rick (much to the delight of his female companion). Late in the afternoon Max and Rick each landed a big blackfin tuna, both of which made spectacular strikes on the kite baits. With almost twenty mutton snappers, a few big yellowtails, a limit of kingfish, an amberjack, two big blackfin tunas, a big shark, and some bonitas, the fishbox was looking very good and our anglers very tired! Just before we pulled the lines in, Max landed a big sailfish that, like the tunas, took a live bait dangling from the kite. The sailfish put and exclamation point on what was already an unbelievable day of fishing only a few short miles from Max's backyard!

Waiters Day

Once a year we show our appreciation to waiters and waitresses and although neither me or my crew are one of these people, there is a waiter who works part time on one of the boats at our marina and this post is dedicated to him. Ryan Bouchard from Massachustts joined us on the L&H along with two of his fishing partners. It was a beautiful day and we decided to run offshore to the gulf stream. Once we arrived in the cobalt blue waters of the stream we were greeted with feeding birds and feeding mahi. For a couple of hours Ryan and his buddies had nonstop action with dolphin and it seemed as if as soon as we finished one school we would find another. After we had our limit of dolphin and a nice tuna we decided to try some wreck fishing. The action on the wrecks was great and we soon had our limit of amberjacks. With a little bit of time left in the trip we decided to anchor and catch some yellow tail snapper. Like everything else we did that day this seemed to work well for us. In about thirty minutes our crew caught nearly two dozen yellowtails and a few big barracuds. The three tired tired fishermen relaxed on the flybridge as the L&H glided over the crystal clear waters off Key Biscayne on the way to the dock. It was truly a great day.

Pompano Rodeo

For the past twenty plus years I have enjoyed fishing the Pompano Beach Fishing Rodeo. It is a fun, family oriented tournament with many ways to win. This year the fishing was spectacular. We always fish on the Frick and Frack which is the 27 conch that I own with my brother Fred. Our team consisted of my wife Debbi, son James, daughter Laurel, long time fishing buddy Mike Welter, my mate Greg Braswell and his brother Chris. It was windy and rough and the fish were biting. This tournament does not place a limit on the number of lines you can fish so we had fourteen or fifteen baits out at all times and everyone on our boat was busy from start to finish both days. At the end of day one we weighed our limit of kingfish and tuna and Debbi added a nice cobia to give us 225 pounds with nine fish and put us in first place, giving us the daily! The second day was nearly as good as we again weighed our limit of kings, three tuna and James added a nice dolphin for good measure. It was good enough for second place overall in the tournament and the second place daily for the final day. The highlight of the tournament for me was the success my children Laurel and James had. Laurel won first place in the small fry division (kids 10 and under) and it was one of the greatest moments of my life watching her face light up as they called her to accept her first place tropy!!! James, as usual made his father proud, by winning the junior division (kids 11-16) by a landslide. Not only did he dominate the juniors, James was named second place angler in the entire tournament beating out nearly four hundred other anglers most of them grown men and women. We also won top family and Debbi and I were named top husband and wife. It was truly a successful tournament for us and one that I am very proud of! I would like to give a special thanks to Greg, Mike, and Chris for all of their hard work and without them none of this would have been possible.

Chucks Busy Day

Chuck Wagner of Chaska, MN fished with me on the L&H eight years ago and we had a great day. So I was very excited when he booked us to try his luck again. Chuck ended up coming by himself and with beautiful weather I knew it would be an awsome day. The bait came easy and we anchored on a shallow wreck. Before we could get all the lines out Chuck was hooked up. For the next hour Wes and I worked fast and furious to keep baits in the water as our angler enjoyed bent rods (often several at a time)! When we left the spot we had our limit of kingfish up to 25lbs, released several others, and Chuck did a great job catching and releasing a big sailfish on twelve pound test! Now it was time to look for bigger game. While Wes got everying reorganized and regrouped I steered the L&H toward a deep shipwreck. Once again Mr. Wagner did a great job muscling up big amberjacks (to sixty pounds) from the deep, with heavy tackle, until we had our limit. With a little more time left in the half day trip, I suggested we try one more spot to see if we could find something different. It was our day! As fast as Wes could get a bait down, we got bit. We added a half dozen almacos, a beautiful twelve pound snapper, and a nice tuna to the now full fishbox! It was one of those days where everything goes right and the Wes/Chuck team performed like a well oiled machine! Thanks again you guys for all the hard work. I hope Chuck will be back with us on the L&H before another eight years go by!

Lucky Max

Max Puyanic has been fishing with me on the L&H for over fifteen years and is always very lucky. Today was no exception. On the way to the bait patch I spotted one of the most beautiful sights any captain could hope to see, a huge school of cobias over the white sand! Wes did a great job shifting gears from getting ready to catch bait to crushing cobias. Max was in Austrailia for a few months and on his first day back on the L&H he never missed a beat. In a matter of seconds Max, his guest for the day Jim, and Wes were all fishting fish 40 to 50 pounds. Our team had to work quick because the school was moving offshore and it would be impossible to stay with them once they got over the edge. In a span of twenty minutes our cobia killers landed 15 fish keeping our limit and releasing the rest to fight another day. It was an awsome sight to behold from my perch in the tower, and all I could do was smile and shout praise to the team as everything went smooth as I could ever hope. After the L&H finished with the cobia school we moved offshore and caught a couple nice tuna, a few bonitas and two big cudas. We came in early on a half day with everyone sporting big smiles as we pulled into the dock with a boxful of fish!