Big fish

[Fr. Frank]

I hooked a 62 pounder in 110 ft. of water off Lost Tree Village south of Jupiter in '87, he never fought at all until I got him near the boat, (I really thought I had hooked a piece of coral or something, just dead weight) then once it saw the boat it took me another 45 minutes to bring him in. I was using a Penn 209 Levelwind and 15lb test line. When we finally lip-gaffed him, the hook was nearly straightened, only the fact that it went through the gristle/cartilage at the corner of his mouth kept the hook from coming out.

The crazy thing is that we were drifting the reef for smoker Kings or Wahoo using large dead mullet for bait. He had to come 20' up off the bottom just to grab the bait.

In the Keys, though, try the 270'-340' deep reef south of Marathon/7 Mile bridge, about 15 miles out. Drifting that reef will always bring some grouper action. You need a long string and lots of weight to get down, though. I use 4oz of lead, and a Penn 4/0 spooled with 600 yds of 50lb PowerPro line (same diameter as 14lb mono). Put it on the bottom, then reel up about 10'.

Of course, there are lots of sharks there, too.
And a friend fishing with me once hooked and brought to the boat a very small (70lb) broadbill swordfish that way. (I had to look up pictures to find out what it was)

Man, I really really love fishing.