Reef Raider Adventures: Target: Mutton Snapper

Welcome back Reef Raider fans...

My Friend Juan Estevez called me in the middle of the week with an idea to Target the Mutton Snapper because of the full moon and in hopes of catching some early spawners.

We put in out of Homestead Bayfront and anchored up just outside the markers to catch some Pin Fish for bait. I put my Pin Fish trap in the water but Juan was a little hasty about where to put it cause he doesn't think it works all that well. I did not have the numbers where I always nail the pins so we chose a random spot and dropped the cage. It did not go well and further managed to shake Juan's confidence in the trap. Luckily we Anchored up some distance away at another spot and managed quite a few Pins on Sabiki. I'll just have to show him the video of how it works the next time I loaded up on that Mutton candy.

We had over 30 pins in the bait well, some decent ones but mostly small ones; in any case we decided to get going, we had a long run south of Carysfort Light for our bounty, and the seas were a little rough. We ran for nearly 25 miles before we found the hole Juan was targeting and soon we were anchored and lines were in the water.

I missed a strike early and while I stopped to re-rig Juan was on with a fish, He landed the first Mutton, a nice size and a good sign. Juan sent down a big strip of Bonito on a troll right and he was on a fish, he caught a nice Margate, they are good eating and always welcomed into the cooler. I got my bait back in the water and after some time I finally got a repeat strike on my rod. I pulled in a nice Mutton and the skunk was off me.

Juan hooked a large fish that ran him too hard to be a Mutton, at first we though it might be a big Black, but soon realized that was not the species either. After a hard battle Juan brought up a very nice Yellow Jack; he says Yellow Jack is some of the best eating fish there is, but since I don’t eat fish I will just have to take his word for it.

We moved from that spot and anchored up again some distance north and BANG! Right away the rod bent over furiously, we were on a wreck so it’s almost a logical conclusion that when that happens, you are likely in for a hard battle with an AJ. Juan worked the big Donk to the boat, and we boated it for some video while Juan took a few minutes to catch his breath. We released the AJ in good shape, and not long after I was on another Donk myself; near the boat a big shadow came up from the depth and bit my AJ about two thirds of the way up his tail, leaving mostly head for me to real in. After a couple of AJ’s and two exhausted anglers we decided to find another spot.

It was late in the day now and Juan decided to do a few drifts; we set up our tackle, found our bearing and made the first pass. Almost immediately I had a nice strike, a great sign that the spot was hot. I caught another nice Mutton, and soon after Juan’s rod was bent over as well. He caught another Mutton and noticed that on the pass there was what appeared to be a nice ball of bait on the Depth Finders screen. Juan decided that it would be a good idea to anchor up, but it didn’t work out and we had caught our last Mutton. We headed home with a nice mixed bag; 4 Mutton, 1 Margate, 1 Yellow Jack, and we released a big AJ and sent another down for the sharks to finish. OH Yeah, and a couple of Trigger Fish; my wife loves trigger fish, but they are a mission to filet.