| Name of Captain; | Greg Mercurio |
| Where were you fishing? | OFFSHORE |
| Is this a tournament entry Fishing Report; | No |
| Date you went fishing; | 02-25-2021 |
| Your Name; | Jack Hexter |
| Your Fishing Report: If this is a tournament report do not state the fish’s length in this box. State the length and species in the box below | I made a semi-annual Yankee Capts trip this last week. Left home on Wed 2/24 and drove to a friends home in Islamorada. The next morning I continued South and arrived at the Yankee Capts at about noon. Loaded my gear and met the new mates Jacob and Fabricio and waited to great Capt Greg and long time first mate Lindon. Ate lunch at the Hogfish Grill which is next to the boat and got under way at 5:00 PM. We drove West and NW for 14 hours and started fishing at 7:00 AM in 450′ of water on Pulley Ridge. This is electric reel territory. I started with 3 pounds of lead and a single hook on a 12′ leader. There was 21 anglers on board and Capt Greg set the boat perfectly so all of us could fish on one side without too many tangles. Fish started to come over the rail, all sorts of fish. I forgot, one of the anglers was trolling on the way out and caught a 60# wahoo, nice fish! Anyway, the bottom fishing was sporadic with Yellow eye snapper, vermillion snapper, and an occasional queen snapper which I dearly wanted to catch. By sundown, I had caught my Queen Snapper, a bunch of vermillion snapper, and lat in the afternoon, I had switched to a 2 hook Hi-Low rig and started bailing the Yelloweye snapper. I actually pulled 3 doubles in a row. We were probably in 650′ at that time. Snowy grouper were also coming over the rail. As we moved off the hard bottom on to mud, some tilefish made their presence known and I caught several, but one was lunch to a shark. At dusk, Capt Greg moved the boat “up on top” in 250′ and we fished conventional tackle (no electrics) for mutton snapper and Red grouper. That evening I did fight two sharks but failed to find any muttons or grouper. I went to sleep at about midnight, woke up at 4:30 to take a leak and stayed up fishing the rest of the day. Caught more yelloweyes, and an Orange Roughy, a first for me — I’ve never even heard of this fish before. Several AJ’s and Almaco Jacks were caught by the boat, AJ’s were released and Almaco’s made it to the fish box. At night the jiggers tangled with blackfin tuna but not to the extent to merit me trying for one. Slow Pitch jigging was prevalent on the boat with a couple anglers even using small electric reels on slow pitch rods. – to each his own. All total, I came home with 5 Queen Snapper, 2 tilefish, the Orange Roughy, about 6 vermillion snapper and 25 Yelloweye snapper. That’s a freezer full of fish!! |
