Awesome day of Sailfishing Charleston, SC. October 17, 2009

While fishing in the Charleston City Marina October Sailfish Slam the team on the HOUDINI (Capt Wayne Skinner, Jim Shannon, Tom Shannon, Daniel Davis, Mel Miles) released 15 Sailfish from 8am – 3pm during tournament fishing hours. Fortunately, for us the weatherman missed the forecast completely it was supposed to be 3 – 6’ building to 4 – 7’ in the afternoon. On the ride out it was calm 1 – 2’ and offshore it was 2 -3’ beautiful calm day to fish for Sailfish. That morning we pulled back just before 8am South East off of the ledge in about 200’ of beautiful blue water. After dropping the outriggers and preparing to deploy the spread “eagle eye” Mel Miles spotted 100 plus birds working the water about a mile out to the South, he said it was 137 birds, (quite the “eagle eye” to count 137 moving birds). We throttled up the boat and headed for the birds. As the boat approached we could see the birds aggressively working the water below them. As the boat got closer to the birds we could see a large green/gray pod of bait fish on the surface of the water. We quickly deployed the spread and did not even have time to get the dredges in the water. We were too excited and anxious to see if we would see any Sailfish. As we trolled over close to the pod of bait, we could see the Sailfish using their fully extended dorsal fins to herd the bait ball up to the surface of the water. The sailfish would then simultaneously start cutting the bait ball with their sails extended and using their bills to stun the bait. The birds were going crazy diving down to catch bait in the air as they popped the surface. As our baits passed the bait ball for the first time we got multiple knock downs. We released two sailfish on the first pass. Then “eagle eye” Mel put us back on the birds we had four lines go down released a triple.

Each time we released fish Captain Wayne put us back on the birds and bait and we hooked up more sails. On the second triple hook up we had all three fish stretched out in different directions one fish went forward and I had to walk up the side gunnel and climb over the outriggers of the boat to fight the fish off of the bow. We released it first and then managed to release the other two fish. We ended the day with 2 triples, 3 doubles and three single hook up and releases. After noon the Sailfish herded smaller bait balls to the surface and the birds spread out to the multiple smaller bait pods. We chased the birds from 400’ to almost 700’ of water before pushing back in shallower.

When we arrived at the City Marina, we completely filled the length of the outrigger with the fifteen flags. It was a very memorable October fishing day offshore Charleston with good friends.

-Jim Shannon