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April 2013 Fishing Report for Miami, Biscayne Bay and Flamingo

We caught this squid while tarpon fishing it would change colors every two seconds .

A crazy cloud formation as a cold front passes Big fish Mark Carlson casting to some laid up tarpon

Valero got a nice spinner shark

Nice tarpon about 125 lbs.

Frank Gordon and his buddy tag teamed this spinner shark

ozzy with a little cuda before we had to run for our lives from thunder storms

We got the leader release on this 100 pond tarpon

Ted son lands this giant tarpon about 150 lbs.

Mike got a bunch of action with big spinner sharks

Mike first tarpon about 110 lbs he had a great day of fishing caught 2 tarpon a spinner shark a nurse shark then got a 9 foot hammerhead shark

Mark getting a close view of his hammerhead shark

Chuck with a little biscayne bone fish

Chuck lands this smaller tarpon after loosing three others we fished hard fro the permit to get the slam but no luck very windy and overcast day

Jonny with one of the 11 tarpon that they hooked that day it was going crazy

Steve obrien lands this tarpon on fly his first

Cris allen one of the 3 tarpon he hooked that day laned one

It’s good to see some smaller tarpon around the big ones have been kicking some ass

This guy has no idea what we caught a 43 inch monster permit

Ted with a nice permit

Rob Herman gets a good spinner shark

Chuck with a small bone fish

Chuck with a nice 28 inch bone fish

March 2013 Fishing Report for Miami, Biscayne Bay and Flamingo

February 2013 Fishing Report for Miami, Biscayne Bay and Flamingo

Beautiful sunset heading out for a night tarpon bite.

32 inch bone fish!

Guy holds his 32” bone fish.

Josh and Mary with one of the many spinner sharks they caught that day.

Big Tarpon boat side.

Chuck lands this 250 lb. bull shark foul hooked in the anal fin Only Chuck could have landed this fish.

January 2013 Fishing Report for Miami, Biscayne Bay and Flamingo

Barracuda fishing was very good this month. Getting all of them on top water lures.

We also got lots of black tip spinner sharks this jump 6 times and was well over 100 lbs.

This was a large ladyfish we hooked next to the boat. ITt ran out all the way to the backing, jumped a couple time and got mauled by black tip spinner sharks.

Tarpon fishing was tough this month with lots of windy days. This was one of the three we hooked that day.

May 2009 Fishing Report for Miami, Biscayne Bay and Flamingo

May is a great month for fishing Miami and Biscayne Bay. There are a lot of Tarpon around moving to and back from the Keys. Good Bone fishing and Permit, lots of Sharks swimming the flats of Biscayne Bay.

I had the chance to take a good friend of mine, Ozzie, out for some Bone fishing. Ozzie has earned the reputation of no matter how good the Bone fishing has been, that when he goes fishing for them they disappear. He had been given the nice name of “Bonefish Repellant”. We set out to try to fix this given name, but first I wanted to do some Tarpon fishing. We get right off the bat around a 100 to 110lb. Tarpon. I always have good luck with Ozzie and Tarpon fishing. Then we headed out for some Bone fishing. Great start!

We had a few shots, but nothing great. Here comes a nice school right at us. Ozzie made a perfect cast, hooks up and about 10 to 15 minutes later he got his first Bonefish! After getting a Bonefish and a Tarpon so far this day, we decided to try for a Permit and see if we could get a Grand Slam for the day. The tide was low and not many Permit around at that time though. Maybe next time.

I had a great night of fly fishing for Tarpon out of Miami with Steve Clark. It looked like we might get some bad thunderstorms, but just missed us. We did get some great fishing in. We hooked 3 in the first 10 minutes of fishing. We had a large school of Tarpon feeding like crazy. The rest of the night went well with Steve hooking a total of 17 Tarpon that night, all fly fishing.

I fished a day with Doug and his friend Nils out of Flamingo. We started out fly fishing for Tarpon and found some laid up Tarpon, all giants. Doug hooked up to around a 130 to 150 lb Tarpon on fly. This Tarpon was so crazy running all over, jumping everywhere. I think it jumped 15 maybe 20 times. It broke through the bite tippet after about 25 minutes of fishing it. We did catch lots of Snook on the fly that day, I think around 7 maybe 10, and had some Redfish on the fly too.

Joe O’hara and his buddies, Glen and Darren, and I had a great morning Tarpon Fishing Miami. We hooked 3 and Glen landed his first Tarpon that would weigh in around 100lbs.

If you’re in Miami, Fort Lauderdale or Palm Beach areas, and you would like to do some Tarpon fishing, Miami is the place to be in May.

April 2009 Miami and Biscayne Bay Fishing Report

I started the month off fishing with Mark DeAngeles. I know that Mark would like to get a Tarpon of 100 pounds or more on the fly rod. We have caught several Tarpon on conventional tackle and hooked a lot of Tarpon on the Fly rod, but never landed one yet on fly. We ha a early departure from Miami and found some nice 35 to 50 lb Tarpon feeding on shrimp. We hooked 2 Tarpon that jumped off, but landed the third. Mark got his first Tarpon on fly.

The next day we did the same trip out of Miami, but this time we hooked a monster Tarpon using the fly rod fighting this fish for a while. I was a bit nervous to leader this fish because I did not want to lose it. Some crazy jumps late in the fight as I was trying to grab the Tarpon, but we got it. She would weigh around 100 to 110 lbs. Later that day we did some bait fishing while fly fishing for some more Tarpon. Mark hooked up to another monster Tarpon that would run 150 lbs or more. This Tarpon ran us all over Biscayne Bay. After around 45 minutes to an hour, I got a chance to grab it. I could just get my hands to the big Tarpon when it would pull away and then pulled the hook out. Considered a caught fish. I still would have loved to have gotten some photos of that monster boat side. It’s difficult to appreciate the true size of this Tarpon.

I fished with Clinton on a nice calm Saturday morning. When we found lots of slow rolling Tarpon right off Miami Beach. We had one bite the fly right off the bat, but did not get the hook into him solid. Hooked a couple more on bait and landed one right in front of Miami South Beach. That Tarpon was around 100 pounds.

I fished Francois and his nephew Alejandro (Alex). We fly fished for Tarpon in the morning. There were lots of Tarpon around but could not get a bite on the fly rod. It was very over cast and windy. We went for Bonefish. Alex had never Bone fished in his life of 12 years and had just a little experience with fly fishing. He was very sharp and learned fast. He hooked and landed his first Bonefish around 9 pounds and hooked 2 more that day. I had the Bonefish pull the hook right by the boat. That one looked like 9 or 10 lbs. On the last Bonefish he caught, a shark ate it. It just came from no where, ran the Bonefish down and bit it’s tail off. Before Alex could reel in the rest of the fish, the seven foot Lemon Shark took the rest of the Bonefish. I hate when that happens and we try to break them off, but this shark took it so fast, we could not do anything for the Bonefish.

The next day I fished with Steve and his son. We started fast hooking up to a Tarpon just as I was letting the bait out. Steve fought it for a while then lost it after about 30 minutes of fighting. His son hooked the next one and landed this Tarpon that would weigh around 70 lbs. The Tarpon quit biting so we headed off to do some Shark fishing. First we needed some Shark bait so I fished an area for Ladyfish. They both had a blast catching Ladyfish on light spin tackle. We then headed out for Shark. Right away a small Lemon Shark came up and takes the bait, ran off about 50 yards and just came off. We reeled the bait in to check it out. Everything was fine with the rig. I could see another Shark in the chum slick, a very hot Shark! I cast the bait out and as soon as it hit the water this Shark charged at it and ate it in seconds. Hooked up again. This time a very big Spinner Shark. It took off running and jumping, probably took 150 yards of line off the reel before I could get the boat going. After about a 40 minute fight, we landed it, weighing around 100 to 125 lb Spinner Shark.

I had a great night fishing with Teemu from Finland. The weather did not look good from the start, but they wanted to go. It was blowing 30 mph with gusts to 45mph. It laid down later in the night to winds of around 20mph. We got some great fishing in. We hooked 2 Tarpon on fly and landed 3 Tarpon. That was a great job of fishing. After having such a good night, I told Teemu to try 1 more spot. I told him where to cast his fly, he layed it in there perfectly and a giant Tarpon jumped out of the water and landed on his fly. Hooked up solid. This big Tarpon took off, jumping like crazy. At one point it looked like a giant rock skipping across the surface of the water. Teemu really put the hurt to this fish, got him boat side in 20 minutes. He broke his rod but we still landed the Tarpon that would weigh around 130 lbs.

I had a great day fishing with Doug from Texas. We went out for Tarpon and Sharks. We hooked 9 tarpon that morning and a couple sharks, but was unable to land any. It just happens that way sometimes.

March fishing report for Miami and Biscayne Bay

It started out cold and windy, but after it warmed up, the Tarpon fishing was good all month long.

I fished with Jay from Montreal, Canada on a cold windy morning. We hooked up to 3 Tarpon off Miami that day, but could not land any of them. Jay did land one nice size Permit. We did have a lot of big Bull Sharks and a 12-foot Hammer Head Shark circling his bait, but maybe it was just too cold that day.

I was able to fish with Mark and Sam Schwan again. I think Sam has grown another 5 inches since last year while he has been practicing his fly-fishing that he has improved quite a bit over that time. I think that he caught around 6 different species on the fly rod and a few Lemon Sharks on bait.

When the weather got nice again, I took a good friend, Chuck Veith, out to Flamingo for some Tarpon fishing in the Everglades National Park. The Tarpon were there and the bite was on! Chuck hooked up to 18 Tarpon that day all ranging from 80 to 150 lbs. We got to see so many Tarpon jumping and slamming his lures that day. It was great fishing that day.

I had Shawn and his girl friend show up just as they got off the cruise ship. Shawn runs an offshore fishing charter business out of the Northeast. We got into some good fishing right away and landed a nice 7-foot Bull Shark. They hooked up a couple Spinner Sharks that broke off after jumping several times. They also got a couple 3-foot Barracuda and one nice Bonefish.

Daniel and his daughter, Daphnine, had a great weather day with some very good fishing. Daphnine had her own gear and this very cool little Avet reel with a g-loomis rod that I wanted to see her land a Tarpon on. She got a hit by the first Tarpon while letting line out. She hooked it up and landed it in about 30 minutes. She hooked 2 more Tarpon; one that would have been close to 150 lbs. Daniel then got hooked up and landed his first Tarpon that day. We then went Shark fishing and got a couple bites from Spinner Sharks. We moved on to try some Permit fishing when Daphnine hooked one and landed it. From there, we decided to try to get the slam, which is catching a Tarpon, a Permit and a Bonefish in the same day. We had a couple of shots at Bonefish, but lost our sun and ran out of time. Maybe next time.

February fishing report for Miami and Biscayne Bay

This February was a very cold and windy month for us. We still managed to get some good fishing even on the bad weather days. Richard took his 12 year old daughter Crosby out for a half day of fishing.

She has been taking fly casting lessons at her school and they both thought it was time to cast at some fish instead of just casting in the grass. Crosby landed three different species of fish that day, all on the fly rod. She also learned how to fight and land saltwater fish on fly.

Bill Denkin came down again and we fished a half day that was cold and windy. It was too cold for the tarpon to be around, but he caught plenty of other fish that day, including 2 nice Pompano that he and his wife had for lunch. Bill also got one very big Lemon Shark.

Jim Wong had a very nice weather day. We hooked up some Big Tarpon that morning, but pulled the hooks on them. Went out for Sharks and found some nice ones. Jim got two big Lemon Sharks and one big Nurse Shark. He had lots of Big Bull Sharks circling the bait that just weren’t hungry that day.

Emily Weiss and her husband got hooked into a couple nice Tarpon in the morning. Emily landed one that was around 120 lbs.

Isaac Mizrahi and his son Evan, who has become quiet the accomplished angler and boat captain came to fish Miami and had a nice weather day. We found lots of Tarpon that day, but just could not get a bite--lots of boat traffic from the Miami boat show. We were able to catch some big sharks though.

The next day we fished out of Flamingo which is in the Everglades National Park. We again found lots of big Tarpon but could not get a bite. We did have one Tarpon crash a jerk bait, and Evan got a nice Jack while fishing a mangrove shoreline.

December-January Fishing Report for Miami Biscayne Bay

On a cold windy morning I took a fellow fishing guide Guy Warren and his mother to Flamingo for some bait fishing. They both caught around 10 different species of fish with around 12 Red Fish and around 10 Goliath Grouper.

The next day we fished out of Miami for Bone Fish. Guy's mom got one around 6 lbs. which is small for Biscayne Bay. Guy caught several fish on the fly rod, some of them were Blue Fish, Lady Fish and Blue Runners and a couple nice Jacks.

I have had two trips this year with Chuck Veith, both have been good days. The first day we hooked 3 Tarpon off Miami and landed one Tarpon around the 75 to 80 lb class. We had some good shots at Bone Fish that we tried to get on the fly rod.

Our next trip started out in dense fog and my GPS does not like to work when I need it. But I managed to find the spot off Miami where the Tarpon had been. We fished for a while without getting hooked up, but waited to see if we could get one of these Tarpons to eat. We hooked one, while still in the fog, and it was very cool not knowing where we were. Nothing was visible but fog and yet he hooked up to a big Tarpon. Chuck fought that Tarpon perfectly and we landed it, she weighed around 120 lbs. We did not get hooked up to any more Tarpon that day. We found some Bone Fish but no luck hooking them. The clouds and wind came up from an approaching cold front, so we went to fishing the channels where we hooked 2 large Barracuda and caught 1 big Spinner Shark that jumped about 6 feet in the air and we landed it. The Spinner Shark weighed around 150 lbs.

Captain Doug

June 2008 Fishing Report for Miami Biscayne Bay

This is the best month of the year to fish the Miami's inshore waters and the flats of Biscayne Bay. All three of the big species that are sought after in Flats fishing are available during this month. These would consist of Tarpon, Permit, and Bone Fish. This year we had some of the best Tarpon fishing ever. We had some days that we hooked as many as 15 Tarpon all over the 100 lb. class while bait fishing. Some nights we had hooked as many as 10 Tarpon while Fly Fishing.

Claude David and his buddy Jack came down from Montreal Canada to do some Tarpon fishing. They both hooked and caught several Tarpon both during the day trips and the night trips.

They had some great fishing just off Miami Beach with hundreds of Tarpon rolling around and hooked them on shrimp and Jig head and did some shrimp casting to lay up Tarpon. This is quite the show with so many Tarpon all around you whith Miami's finest women catching some of Miami's best sun rays.

Captain Doug

May 2008 Fishing Report for Key Biscayne Bay and Miami

Tarpon have been all over the Miami Beach and Biscayne Bay area through the month of May. We did have some bad weather days, but that is to be expected for this time of year. Even with the bad weather, we found lots of Bone Fish and a very good amount of large Permit in the 15 to 25 pound range. Some were even in the 30 plus pound range.

Shark fishing was also very good at this time of year with some very big Bull Sharks, Hammer Head Sharks, lots of Lemon Sharks and Spinner Sharks (also known as Black Tip Sharks) that are all just minutes from Miami and South Beach.

Michael and his two sons help Dad battle a 100lb Tarpon that we hooked while fishing inshore of Miami.

Peter Fuller split 2 half day trips of fishing with his two sons. They had some great fishing just off Miami Beach, hooking three big Tarpon. He ended up pulling the hook on one Tarpon and the other two Tarpon threw the hooks while jumping.

Then Peter caught one giant Permit off the flats of Biscayne Bay.

While his son was Shark fishing, he got a big Barracuda and a small Hammer Head Shark.

Captain Doug Lillard

April 2008 Fishing Report for Miami and Biscayne Bay

My good friend Ozzy (Oswaldo Saiki) had an open afternoon to go fishing with me. We decided to try to catch this giant Hammer Head Shark that was 12 to 13 feet long! The shark was in the Miami area eating Tarpon.

We first set out to catch bait. Ozzy caught some ladyfish and blue fish, both are very oily and sharks love to eat them. We also caught some nice sized Pompano that Ozzy brought home and had for dinner. After getting the bait, we headed back to Miami and set up for some shark fishing. I filleted the lady fish and blue fish and hung them off the back of the boat for chum. It did not take long for a bull shark to show up, but we both wanted to get the giant hammerhead shark so we did not put our bait in the water yet. After about 30 minutes of chumming, we had 3 big bull sharks and some big black tip sharks come and go very fast.

We decided to try for one of the Bull sharks and dropped the bait back into the chum line. They first came up and gave the bait a good look, circled around for a while until one could not stand it any longer, and ate the bait. We were hooked up using a Penn 975 International reel, spooled up with 30lb. spider wire braided line. This was going to be a long fight. After an hour, never seeing the shark for the whole time, she came along side the boat. It was HUGE! She was 10 feet long and around 400lbs. We were able to slip a gaff inside her mouth and secure a rope off her tail. We took the shark to some shallow water. Ozzy is a professional photographer and I wanted to get a shot of myself in the water with a giant Hammerhead, but this bull shark will do!

We pulled the shark into some shallow water near by to get set up to take the pictures. The shark was so fat that I could barely get my legs around her belly. Her head was so heavy I could hardly lift it out of the water. The whole time, I made sure the water was going through her gills and the shark was okay. After taking some very cool shots, it was time to set he shark free. I grabbed her dorsal fin and tail, pushed her into the deeper water when the shark started to swim on her own, but swam straight into the boat which she got stuck between the push pole and the boat. While she was confused and thrashing around, the shark could not find her way back to the deep waters. I went to get the shark by her tail and shoved her out between the boat and push pole, directing the shark in the right direction. This was by far the coolest and craziest short release I've ever had.

About 2 minutes later, Ozzy and I were back in the boat congratulating each other on a great job. We noticed that same shark heading straight back to the boat. This shark is on a mission I had my feet dangling in the water and quickly got them out and stood up. It swam right into the boat, banged into it HARD and then took off right straight where it came from.

Captain Doug

March 2008 Fishing Report for Biscayne Bay and Miami

We had some typical weather for March with strong winds and high overcast cloud cover , making sight fishing for Bonefish and Permit very difficult. We did have some good days this month for Bonefish, but when the conditions are tough for sight fishing I like to go for something better. Tarpons were around in okay numbers, not as solid as in years past, but enough Tarpons to get hooked up.




The Shark fishing was also very good this month. I think that on the windy, over cast days, it makes a great Shark fishing day, and the Biscayne Bay Miami area has lots of sharks to fish for. Most of the sharks were some very large Spinner Sharks. Some giant Bull Sharks up to 10 foot in length and over 400 lbs. This is pretty cool to see them in the inshore and Flats of Biscayne Bay. We also hooked into a couple big Hammerhead Sharks in the 8 to 10 foot class that just broke our gear.


Mark Schwan of Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and his 15 year old son Sam, had some good fishing for both Tarpon and Sharks. Sam got his first Tarpon that weighed over 100 lbs. They also caught a bunch of Lemon and Nurse Sharks. They also hooked a couple of big Bull Sharks and some Black Tip Spinner Sharks.

January and February Miami Biscayne Bay Fishing Report 2008

Well we had another unseasonably warm and nice January with most of the day in the 70's to 80's and sunny. I t usually is one of the worst months of the year weather wise, but the past 2 years has been one of the best. The Tarpon bit was very good during the day and the night. With lots of Tarpon getting hooked and landed well over 100 pounds. Most all of the Tarpon caught during the day were on crabs. We got a lot of Tarpon during these past 2 months on Fly while fishing Miami at night. Most of the night Tarpon have been running around 30 to 70 pounds, but the big Tarpon in the 100 plus pound range have been coming while bait fishing. I took Brian Logan and his friend Kent out for night Tarpon fishing in Miami. Both guys hooked several Tarpon that night on fly and both got to land their first Tarpon on fly.



Bone fishing in the Biscayne Bay area has been very good these past couple of months. I've been finding schools of Bone fish running from 7 to 10 lbs. with a few 12 pounds mixed in. This is not uncommon to find such large Bone fish in this part of Biscayne Bay. I had a trip with an English Man named Steve Ogden, who wanted to fish his 10 foot spinning rods. This was very interesting to me to watch how well he could cast these rods. We hooked up on our first and second chances of Bonefish. He got one 8 lb. Bone fish and another around 31 inches which should be about 10 to 11 lbs. That's pretty good fishing. After those two Bone fish, he went to the fly rod and had some shots, but could not get hooked up. Later we found plenty of Bluefish and big Ladyfish to play with on the fly rod. We also fished a night trip where Steve hooked and landed around a 50 lb. Tarpon on his 10 foot spinning rod. I thought that he would get his ass kicked by a Tarpon on such a long rod, but he landed it pretty quick with his tackle.



There have also been lots of sharks around these past couple months. I noticed some very large Spinner sharks and Black tip Sharks. Some very big Bull sharks, ranging from 6 to 10 feet long were around too. There have not been many Lemon sharks around, but the next couple months should be very good for them.

Click here to read the 2007 fishing reports.