By Marco Pompano, Surf Fishing Guide
This Pompano season has been different than any other because of the strong currents and Saragosa seaweed. It’s been hit or miss, and, to use a baseball term, we bunted onto first base and stole second and third. No home runs this season. It’s been like that: some great runs of catching my limit and the next day, nothing. Then the currents come in, then seaweed comes in. Then the rain and wind comes. The window of opportunity has not opened wide. But the fish have been here. So, when it calms down enough to fish, it’s time to Bamba. Guess what? It’s on! Bamba time!
The last few days I’ve been fishing with my wife, Sophie, and I’ve had a few charters, people with hardly any experience coming to the beach and learning by casting, baiting, reeling, setting the drag, and catching, which is what’s been going on all week. My new friends, Neal and Tanya, took on the task to learn how to surf fish. I showed them everything from scratch. They were up to the task within two hours of fishing by themselves. Within a four hour period they pulled in five whiting and five keeper pompanos. Ya, mon! I filleted them up and they took a big bag of beautiful whiting fillets back to the West coast of Florida, and I’m sure, when they get out there, it’s gonna be fish taco time for them and their friends. Swe-e-e-et!
It’s starting to get hot out. The ocean water is heating up and we’re really surprised that the pompano are still hanging out. It’s such a great feeding ground where I fish, with coquina shells in the sand and lots of sand fleas showing up just as the tide hits the beach. Digging up your own sand fleas and pulling in pompano: that’s the way it’s supposed to go. I’ve been fishing with mostly sand fleas and some crab knuckles. They’ve been mostly hitting the fleas and I’m set up right now watching something tap tap tap on my pole but didn’t take it…All right, I’ll wait for its bigger brother or sister.
The water temperature today is 81° which means the pompano should be leaving pretty soon, but they’re still here. I know they are because my rod is bending over. It’s been a good day. I have half a bucket full of pompano and black drum with a few whiting thrown in. I’ve caught most of them on sand fleas. Here’s a little about sand fleas (I like to give a lesson every now and then). Sand fleas are shrimp-like crustaceans, also called hoppers. They grow to one inch long, but the ones you like for bait are usually smaller. They carry bright orange eggs underneath the shovel on their bottom. We rake for them right at the shoreline, where they live in colonies. You can find them six inches to a foot deep and break your back a little bit and you’ll get some great bait for the day. Because the small ones are very good to use, I double them up. I call it piggyback on my hook and it works real great.
So now we gotta get these fish back home, and put on the good reggae music. The nice recording artist is Shaggy, who gets the beat going real good. You gotta chill to grill, and me and these fish are heading to the smoker.
