Sunday, 5/22/11 … Professional Tarpon Tournament Series

Today was the start of the Professional Tarpon Tournament Series (PTTS).

The competition starts @ 7:00 AM and goes until 10:00 AM, with the first hour being the best.

Our team, Organized Chaos, hooked a small tarpon, about 100 pounds, right away. After fighting the tarpon for 10 minutes, the hook pulled out and we lost him.

Twenty minutes later we hooked another slightly larger fish, which we landed after a 22 minute fight.

Our team made a mutual agreement to take this fish to the scale because only a few fish were being caught. You are only allowed one weigh-in per tourney. You also get points for leader touches.

Out tarpon came in at 132 ponds and we were initially in 4th place. We got bumped downed to 7th place by the end of the tourney as other boats came in.

All in all, a good start to the series. We are in around 6th place over all in the points race.

To follow the series more closely go to pttstv on Facebook.

Fair winds and following seas,

Captain Joey Burnsed ~ call 239-472-8658 or email captjoefred@gmail to book a charter.

Saturday, 5/21/11 … good day, getting ready for Sunday tarpon tourney

Hank & Captain Joey.

Another good day today.

We caught sea trout, grouper and mackerel in Captiva Pass, along with many small sharp nose and black nose sharks.

We also ran around North Captiva sight-seeing and spotting many dolphins and a few manatees.

Tomorrow, Sunday, we have the beginning of the PTTS tournament.  Hopefully, we’ll have some good luck.

Fair winds and following seas,

Captain Joey Burnsed ~ call 239-472-8658 or email captjoefred@gmail to book a charter.

Friday, 5/20/11 … no record tarpon, but still a good fishing day

Today may not have been as extraordinary as yesterday, with the fight with the huge tarpon, but it was still good fishing.

Fished on the beach side of Captiva by the Blind Pass jetty and caught a few nice trout and a snapper.

We saw one tarpon further out and tried to catch him, but he wasn’t interested in what we had to offer.

Moved up to North Captiva and fished a couple miles out of Captiva Pass. We caught mackerel, ladyfish, jacks, and two sharp nose sharks.

We went back on the inside of North Captiva looking for tarpon; we saw a few tarpon and a lot of other fisherman, but had no luck catching a tarpon.

All in all, a good day!

Fair winds and following seas,

Captain Joey Burnsed ~ call 239-472-8658 or email captjoefred@gmail to book a charter.

Thursday, 5/19/11 … Jimmy’s charter lands likely record sized tarpon at Boca Grande

Jimmy, Tarpon, Boca Grande Pass, Sanibel & Captiva Islands & Fort Myers Charters & Fishing Guide Service.
Jimmy, Tarpon, Boca Grande Pass, Sanibel & Captiva Islands & Fort Myers Charters & Fishing Guide Service.

We broke out of our tarpon slump in a big way today!

Captain Jimmy Burnsed, my cousin, and I took our boats to Boca Grande at noon to fish the tide change that occurred at 2:00 PM.

Crystal, my wife, caught a 125 lb tarpon on our first drift.

While we were landing our fish, Jimmy also hooked a fish, a tremendous 250 lb tarpon, on his drift.  Jimmy and the folks on his boat then proceeded to fight the tarpon for two hours while we took photos and cleared the way with my boat.

At one point, I had to run interference with my boat and block what we estimated to be an over a 15 foot great hammerhead to keep the shark from attacking and eating the huge tarpon.

This fish was the biggest tarpon Jimmy or I have ever seen or heard about, so we tagged the tarpon, took it to the beach, got measurements, then released the giant fish.

The tarpon was 88 inches long and 44 inches in girth.

We could have kept the fish and taken it to a scale to get the state record, but we don’t believe in killing tarpon.  People will just have to take our word that this was probably the biggest tarpon ever caught in Florida.

I also talked to Chris Fischer from “Shark Men”, the show on the National Geographic Channel, and he wants us to radio him immediately if we see another big hammerhead.  They are here filming and researching great hammerheads.

It was a an Ernest Hemingway quality fishing day.  We’ll be telling stories about this for years!

Fair winds and following seas,

Captain Joey Burnsed ~ call 239-472-8658 or email captjoefred@gmail to book a charter.

 

Wednesday, 5/18/11 … saw a huge bull shark on the bay side of Sanibel

We caught some trout on the beach side of Captiva and then went inside Captiva Pass and caught a shark right away.

We saw a huge bull shark on the bay side of Sanibel, but he wasn’t hungry and wecouldn’t hook ’em.

Fair winds and following seas,

Captain Joey Burnsed ~ call 239-472-8658 or email captjoefred@gmail to book a charter.

 

Tuesday, 5/17/11 … National Geographic “Shark Men” chasing great hammerheads in Boca Grande

Tough fishing.  Caught a bull shark off Captiva and some trout, a mackerel, ladyfish off Sanibel.

Interesting sighting was the “Shark Men” boat from the National Geographic Channel.

They usually are in the Pacific catching and researching great white sharks, but they are in Boca Grande studying the great hammerheads that congregate there. I guess they must be filming for a future episode on hammerheads.

Great hammerheads and big bull sharks come into Boca Grande Pass to feed on the tarpon in May and June.

Several years ago, a 13 foot, 1,000 pound hammerhead was caught in Boca Grande Pass. Sadly, it was a pregnant female. This is why I am a big supporter of catch and release for sharks.

Fair winds and following seas,

Captain Joey Burnsed ~ call 239-472-8658 or email captjoefred@gmail to book a charter.

Monday, 5/16/11 … catching live bait is critical this time of year

Throwing the cast net for bait fish.

No matter what your fishing for, tarpon, snook, redfish, etc., you are often only as good as the bait you use.

Cast net settling over bait fish.

And you pretty much need to catch fresh, healthy, live bait fish every day this time of year. Sometimes you even need to catch bait fish a couple of time a day.

Catching the right bait is most often one of the hardest tasks of the day for me and many anglers.  The wind, tides and water clarity are a few of the factors that can determine how many bait fish you end up with in your live well.

The grey back pilchard is the most common bait I like to use for the wide variety of fish in our waters.  I usually catch these pilchards in 3-4 feet of water with an 8 – 10 foot, 3/8 inch mesh cast net.

Loading bait into the live well.

In the spring, chumming is a must to attract bait.  When chumming for pilchard, I like to have the wind and tide headed in the same direction, preferably toward shallower water.  Time of day and tidal movement are big factors on the amount of bait fish you may catch.

I like to start chumming early in the morning before the sun breaks the horizon.  I also favor stronger tidal movements to carry the chum away from the boat to attract bait fish from afar.   If the tide is changing (at max ebb or max flood), it is very challenging and the bait fish are hard to come by.

If fishing from the shores of Sanibel and Captiva you can often find pilchards running up and down the beaches or around structures like the Sanibel Pier or Blind Pass Bridge (the bridge separating Sanibel and Captiva).

Look for the brown pelicans; they most often find the bait more quickly than we do.  Chum is not required for these areas.  Just look for a couple mirror like flashes in the water and toss the cast net immediately on those flashes.

One more thing to remember is that pilchards die quickly in stagnant or hot water and overcrowding your live well also reduces the quality of your bait fish.  About a hundred bait fish per 20 gallons of water, with a flow of fresh rejuvenating sea water at 500 hundred gallons per hour, would be a recommended maximum capacity.

Go to this link to see some Sanibel & Captiva style cast net throwing instructions I found on the web:

http://www.castnetworld.com/cast-net-throwing.html

Practice, practice, practice!

Fair winds and following seas,

Captain Joey Burnsed ~ call 239-472-8658 or email captjoefred@gmail to book a charter.

Sunday, 5/15/11 … weekly outlook – tarpon moving into Boca Grande Pass

Tarpon jumping off Captiva.

Tarpon are on the move off Captiva and in Pine Island Sound.

The tarpon are making their annual migration to Boca Grande Pass.

As water temperatures rise, a lot of the tarpon move into Boca Grande Pass to fatten up on the shrimp and crab migrations that occur in late May and June.

The tarpon feed into July and then head offshore to give birth to their live larva and don’t return until October.

The best times to fish Boca Grande Pass are first thing in the morning, on the tide change, and on the late evening full moon outgoing tides.

Boca Grande Pass, Charlotte Harbor, Florida Current
Units are knots

Sunday 2011-05-15   
Sunrise  6:41 AM EDT, Sunset  8:09 PM EDT
Moonset  4:56 AM EDT, Moonrise  6:31 PM EDT
Slack Water:   2:33 AM EDT  -0.0
    Max Ebb:   4:19 AM EDT  -0.7
Slack Water:   6:03 AM EDT   0.0
  Max Flood:   9:42 AM EDT   2.5
Slack Water:  12:41 PM EDT  -0.0
    Max Ebb:   4:29 PM EDT  -3.5
Slack Water:   8:17 PM EDT   0.0
  Max Flood:  11:31 PM EDT   2.8

Monday 2011-05-16   
Sunrise  6:41 AM EDT, Sunset  8:09 PM EDT
Moonset  5:43 AM EDT, Moonrise  7:39 PM EDT
Slack Water:   3:47 AM EDT  -0.0
    Max Ebb:   5:07 AM EDT  -0.4
Slack Water:   6:26 AM EDT   0.0
  Max Flood:  10:17 AM EDT   2.6
Slack Water:   1:13 PM EDT  -0.0
    Max Ebb:   5:09 PM EDT  -3.8
Slack Water:   9:05 PM EDT   0.0

Tuesday 2011-05-17   Full Moon
Sunrise  6:40 AM EDT, Sunset  8:10 PM EDT
Moonset  6:35 AM EDT, Moonrise  8:45 PM EDT
  Max Flood:  12:17 AM EDT   2.9
Slack Water:   5:12 AM EDT  -0.0
    Max Ebb:   5:56 AM EDT  -0.1
Slack Water:   6:38 AM EDT   0.0
  Max Flood:  10:53 AM EDT   2.7
Slack Water:   1:48 PM EDT  -0.0
    Max Ebb:   5:52 PM EDT  -3.9
Slack Water:   9:53 PM EDT  -0.0

Wednesday 2011-05-18   
Sunrise  6:40 AM EDT, Sunset  8:10 PM EDT
Moonset  7:32 AM EDT, Moonrise  9:48 PM EDT
  Max Flood:   1:05 AM EDT   2.8
    Max Ebb:   6:45 AM EDT   0.1
  Max Flood:  11:30 AM EDT   2.6
Slack Water:   2:27 PM EDT  -0.0
    Max Ebb:   6:38 PM EDT  -3.7
Slack Water:  10:41 PM EDT   0.0

Thursday 2011-05-19   
Sunrise  6:39 AM EDT, Sunset  8:11 PM EDT
Moonset  8:32 AM EDT, Moonrise 10:44 PM EDT
  Max Flood:   1:55 AM EDT   2.5
    Max Ebb:   7:36 AM EDT   0.3
  Max Flood:  12:11 PM EDT   2.5
Slack Water:   3:10 PM EDT  -0.0
    Max Ebb:   7:26 PM EDT  -3.5
Slack Water:  11:29 PM EDT   0.0

Friday 2011-05-20   
Sunrise  6:39 AM EDT, Sunset  8:11 PM EDT
Moonset  9:33 AM EDT, Moonrise 11:33 PM EDT
  Max Flood:   2:50 AM EDT   2.3
    Max Ebb:   8:29 AM EDT   0.3
  Max Flood:  12:56 PM EDT   2.2
Slack Water:   3:57 PM EDT  -0.0
    Max Ebb:   8:15 PM EDT  -3.1

Saturday 2011-05-21   
Sunrise  6:38 AM EDT, Sunset  8:12 PM EDT
Moonset 10:33 AM EDT, Moonrise 12:16 AM EDT
Slack Water:  12:17 AM EDT   0.0
  Max Flood:   3:44 AM EDT   2.1
    Max Ebb:   9:27 AM EDT   0.3
  Max Flood:   1:47 PM EDT   1.9
Slack Water:   4:47 PM EDT  -0.0
    Max Ebb:   9:07 PM EDT  -2.7

Fair winds and following seas,

Captain Joey Burnsed ~ call 239-472-8658 or email captjoefred@gmail to book a charter.