by Capt. Christina
The months of October and November in Southwest Florida are the start to some of the best fishing around. The waters begin to cool down, which gets the fish moving. Between the mullet hugging the shoreline, and the feeding frenzy of mackerel at the passes, there hasn’t been a shortage of sharks. Recently on a trip down to the 10,000 Islands, we were catching back to back bull sharks along with several blacktips and lemon sharks. Tagging them can be a real challenge, but the data collected can help us understand more about their feeding and migration patterns. A few weeks ago, just off the pass we really got into the feeding frenzy of mackerel. We were able to catch them as quick as we could cast. Several species of shark were also taking advantage of the scraps, including bonnethead sharks and blacktips. A few days later we came upon the same scenario with the feeding mackerel. This time there was a swimmer in the water out past the buoys. He was close enough for us to let him know what he was about to swim into. When we got within a safe distance, we told him about the sharks feeding at the last mackerel frenzy. The tourist was doubtful, but swam in anyway. Bringing us to our next encounter with a shark that wasn’t going to let us get away. About 17 miles off the coast, in an 18ft Formula with a 350-car engine Mercruiser inboard-outboard with a stainless propeller, we hooked into a large tiger shark. After over an hour of letting him pull us every which way, he was starting to get tired. At this point the shark was not keen on having his tail tied and took one last opportunity to break free and turned to bite towards his tail. The shark then went into a barrel roll breaking loose from the rope; at last measure he was over 14’. As we were pulling away from the wreck and the boat got on plane, it felt as if we hadn’t pulled in the anchor; the engine stalled and the boat was pulled off plane. When we turned around, there was the tiger shark thrashing back and forth and breaching the water while shaking his head. He had bit the propeller as we were pulling away from the wreck. While he may have been “the one that got away”, we almost didn’t. Thankfully everyone, including the shark, were unharmed, but to say they aren’t out there is far from reality! Stay safe over the Holidays!
You can follow Captain Christina Kraus on Instagram- Captxtina_naples and
Backwater Fishing Charters coming soon! Stay tuned and Email: Saltwatercaptainchris@gmail.com