Outdoors

Captain's Corner

By Dave Zalewski, Times Correspondent
Published March 13, 2008

What's hot: Larger baitfish, including small blue runners, Spanish sardines, threadfins and hardtails, arrived this week bringing a second wave of larger kingfish and Spanish mackerel. On days last week when we could get out, action was intense from mostly undersized they must be 24 inches from the tip of the nose to the fork in the tail kingfish. It was necessary to cull through many small ones to catch our limit of two per person.

Tactics: Use hardware consisting of spoons and plugs behind Nos. 1 and 2 planers because the fish are not as concentrated as they will be in another week. Best results occurred with a No. 1 gold spoon behind the No. 1 planer and a blue king spoon behind the No. 2.

Tip: Mark the strike location with the MOB button on your GPS. Switching to the highway or plotter mode will allow you to return to the exact spot. This is effective whether trolling hardware or live bait.

Dave Zalewski charters the Lucky Too out of Madeira Beach and can be reached at Luckytoo2@aol.com or (727) 397-8815.

[Last modified March 12, 2008, 20:36:19]