by Chris Sprague, Jr. Angler – “Team Tuppen’s”
Hello Anglers,
I hope you all have been catching fish. This month we went deep dropping for golden tilefish. Golden tilefish are very good eating, however hard to find. They live in 650-900 feet of water and prefer a muddy bottom. We have Garmin electronics on our boat and we use this equipment to help us locate possible spots for golden tilefish. First, we go off shore and start looking for yellow on the Garmin 8617 depth finder. Red is hard and yellow is softer. If there is a hole or drop off and yellow, that is what we are looking for. We move up current and drop our rig, hoping to get to the bottom at the right spot. We tried multiple times at each spot, but couldn’t get one to bite. We moved further offshore and dropped at a spot we had found last year and boom!! Nice golden tile on!!Because we are fishing so deep, we use the Tanacom Bull electric reel. We don’t want to bring them up too fast, as they will spin and come off the hook. It took about 10 minutes to get it in the boat, and then I gaffed it. We only needed 1 fish to feed our family. We enjoyed a nice ride in the ocean back home. My advice on how to catch a golden tilefish is fish off Boca 600-900 or Juno/Jupiter same depth. Unlike looking for grouper in rocks, you are looking for muddy bottom, then drop down bonito or squid. It is hit or miss, but when you find a spot, keep it quiet as goldens are slow growing and overfishing is a problem. As with all fish take only what you plan to eat.
Also, we fished the Pompano Showdown. We worked hard trying to find a wahoo. We caught a 14 pound kingfish and I caught a 35 pound barracuda. We didn’t win anything, but we had a great day on the ocean.
Tight Lines!