Captain’s Corner for June 13 Dave Zalewski 397-8815

Water temperature is hovering around 83 degrees offshore in the gulf and this temperature usually indicates that kingfish have left our area and now are residing in the panhandle area of Florida and the other upper gulf states. In past years trolling has targeted Spanish mackerel, bonita and barracuda through the summer months. We have been pleasantly surprised by the amount of kingfish that we have encountered in the past week. It started with the deployment of a stinger rig with either a frozen sardine, small blue runner or live Spanish sardine which produced several quality fish and numerous strikes while targeting bottom fish in the 60 to 80 foot depths.
Method:
In the past when the bottom bite ended, we simply pulled up our lines and left the spot for another nearby where we would anchor and start the bottom fishing procedure again. The pelagic fish are attracted to the boat while bottom fishing for several reasons. The primary being the chum slick being produced in the water column by the bottom fish expelling their stomach contents on the way up caused by the pressure differential and the loss of baits off the hooks ,along with smaller reef fish being released in a stunned condition which become easy prey.
We now spend 10 to 15 minutes after every bottom stop slow trolling live baits or spoons behind planers in a figure 8 pattern over the place we have fished. Not every place produces, but when it does the results have been great.