It's the weekend of the 19th of April 2002. The forecast called for cloudy skies and potential downpours on Friday night. Winds out of the S, SE 15 mph.
On Friday, Nelson and I were invited to spend the weekend at a friends house on Bokeelia. Nelson and I arrived at his place around 7p.m. All three of us in his 16ft. Backcountry made a quick run to the sound to see if we could spot some bait before darkness set in. We were looking for pinfish because we were after a fat Jewfish another captain had told me about near Useppa. We did not manage any Jews but after a few cast we did pick up 15 or 20 big threads. I knew we needed pinfish but sometimes you just have to go with what you have and hope for the best. The wind was kicking up 15 to 20 out of the south with a huge thunderhead coming our way, so we had to take our best shot at the Jewfish and get out of there before we got swamped. When we arrived at the Jewfish spot we baited up the 9/0 penn and tossed the frisky thread into the jews lair but unfortunately we could only knock at his door. He did not want to play. I believe it had more to do with the bait than the fishes appetite. It was time to leave anyway and we just made it back to the house before all the heavens opened up. Sure glad we left when we did.
It's 5:30 in the morning on Saturday the 20th the alarm clock rings, it's time to get up and go catch some bait. We were off at 5:45 and at the bait spot by 6:00. Boy was it dark and we haven't been fishing the area alot so it made it real tough to get where we wanted to go. Unfortunately our extra early start did not pay off because we still had to wait until daylight to get bait. The bar off of Bokeelia was to hard to find in the middle of the night so we left and went to the grassflats off of Useppa and loaded up there with some nice white bait in about 30 minutes. Off we went to that same hole where Nelson had caught those two snook he is holding up on the front page. The bite was slow but we did manage one keeper 28 inch snook. The next part of the day we visited all of our other favorite spots and they just did not produce that day. It seemed as if every hole we wanted to fish someone else was already there. I think there were more boats than fish. Accepting our fate we decided to tuck our tail between our legs and head for the bar off of Charlotte Harbor for some kind of action. Going to the bar off of Bokeelia was our best move of the day. At first the bite was slow and then we started getting into some very large trout. The trout bite began to slow so we crossed over the bar in hopes of finding some more action and boy did we. The next thing we know in about 10 foot of water we saw a cobia of about 32 inches and then we saw one of the largest cobias I have ever seen, it had to got 80 lbs. or so. Chase threw out the last pinfish we had in the bait well and within 2 minutes FISH ON!!! His drag started to scream and we thought just maybe we got that big one but instead it was just the 32 incher. We continued to troll around looking for more Cobia action and then we found it right under the boat. There was that beatiful 80 pounder 10 feet below us. We all drew our weapons. Chase tossed out a white bait, I tossed out a green Berkley Power Bait, and Nelson took one of the trout we had in the well cut his head off and hooked him up to the 9/0. We all tossed our baits on top of the fishes head and the Cobia engulfed Nelson's trout tail. The fight lasted about 20 minutes which is a little less than normal for that size of fish but what else would you expect from that heavy of tackle? That fish was so large I was kind of scared when it came time to boga grip him at the side of the boat. Fortunately for me Nelson had pretty much wore the fish slap out. Not long after landing the Cobia we decided to head in. We just didn't know which one of us was strong enough to pick him up and put him in the boat. I believe it took somewhere around 2 hours to clean that guy. Next time I think we will let the monster go and work on one a little smaller.
Until next time may you have some line singin, leader frayin, drag screamin action!!!
