Fishing In Miami is excellent. We usually start our fishing trips in Miami by catching bait. It is primarily a live bait fishery because of two reasons. It is the most effective technique for catching fish of all sorts and we have more bait available here than in any other location on the eastern seaboard. It is, quite frankly, the Live Bait Fishing Capital of the World.
At least for the winter and spring months the fishing here is done in very close proximity to the beach in a very small area. We are usually fish 3 miles off the beach but we typically don’t fish more than four miles off the beach. We do however have at least 30 miles of coastline to fish so our options are great.
Whenever you are targeting pelagic species in a very confined area, live bait definitely out fishes trolling. If the fish are spread out trolling is more effective as it allows you to actually find the fish as you fish. As a matter of fact we usually use this technique to find a good area. Once we know where they’re at, we can deploy the fishing kites with live bait. Using this technique one will probably out fish the trolling boats.
The two primary types of live bait fishing in Miami are Kite and flat lines. With flat lines, you simply hang some baits off the outriggers. We can usually deploy about 4 to 6 lines using this technique. It is very effective and can be very enjoyable. To the purist that wants to forgo the fishing kites, it is a great technique and an avid fisherman must learn to master the technique to fish in South Florida. Nothing beats hooking up a Sailfish with a nice ballyhoo on a flatline. Bites occur close to the boat and are usually violent. The action really gets crazy when we get multiple bites.
When we get the right conditions we can deploy the kites and they are much more effective for all the species. The reason for this is that we can cover a larger area with the case and employee more baits in this area. The presentation is better as the fish only sees a small portion of the leader dangling from the Kite in front of the bait. We seldom have a fish that sees the bait and does not eat it. It is the most effective fishing technique known to man.
The baits that we use are varied and are usually silver and about 3 to 6 inches long. These baits will allow us to catch anything that swims in the ocean. The species we most often use are Sardines, Blue Runners, Threadfin Herring, Cigar Minnows and Pilchards. We can usually find those on the way out or we can stockpile them for tournaments and for when we know it will be tough to catch them. Catching bait can be quite fun. But if our customers have a time constraint, we can purchase them from a bait salesman on the way out to the fishing grounds.
If you have never fished live bait the way we do in South Florida, then you are in for a real treat as the action can be fantastic. Find more information on our Charter Information page.
Smaller resident Sailfish
