The Fall season was slow on the MisStress but I fished the "Dosa Marie" (a friends 38 Bertram) in a couple of tournaments to catch most of the sails and dolphin. The Fall bite on both was nothing short of outstanding, on one trip we had 25 dolphin over 20 pounds and shots at 11 sails (only released 2 that day, I guess we were fishing with hooks by "Goodyear"). The bottom bite has been pretty steady offshore for Jan and Feb with one trip having 60 vermillion snapper, 12 triggers, 2 Red snapper, 12 sea bass and that is just what we kept (we released over 25 red snapper just under the 20" minimum size).

The inshore fishing was very good except for the coldest parts of Dec and Jan. I had a lot of limit days on redfish. I saw some extreme catches on flounder last fall with catches ranging from 10 to 17 keepers per trip. The trout bite was pretty good during Feb. but with the season closed during that month it was strictly catch and release.

The coming months of April through July will see the best of the near shore trolling for kings, cobia, mahi, and sailfish with bottom fishing picking up on the near shore artificial reefs until the water temp gets into the hi 70's. The trolling will remain good to outstanding through the summer and into the fall as long as the live bait stays local (the sardines and cigar minnows never showed up in force last summer and we struggled for bait on some days though we always had enough to fish).

The inshore, ICW, fishing will steadily get better with the warming water temps with some reds and trout being caught into late July and turning on again in late Sept. as the water temps get back down below 80.