April 2 General Meeting

(Pictured are: Upper left, Tom Chamberlain
2nd, Steve Butcher, Madison Wichers receiving for Tom Wichers, and Van Wichers
3rd and 4th, Ian and Skyler Wichers)




About 40 Club Members attended the SSC general meeting last evening at Finest Kind Marina enjoying food, wine (or sodas), and fellowship. Guest speaker was Tom Chamberlain of Coral Reef Electronics who talked about the latest technologies available and soon to come for boats of all sizes. He also addressed the best ways to convert Loran numbers to lats & lons for GPS as well as WAAS and AIS. For more information, contact Tom at his office (772-283-3340) and set an appointment.

President Andy Kubiac awarded Sailfish Release Pendants and certificates for diamonds to people who had earned them since our November meeting. (For details, see the Nov. 15 posting in the Port Report.)

Joining 13 members who received Pendants in November are 5 more people, Steve Butcher, Tom Wichers, Brian Schmidt, Mike Fogel, and Van Wichers. People receiving certificates for diamonds are Mary Jo Grell (3 diamonds, 108 releases), Rudy Polselli (3 diamonds, 106 releases), Ian Wichers (2 diamonds, 78 releases), and Skyler Wichers (1 diamond, 59 releases).

People releasing 25 sails receive a pendant, and earn a certificate for a diamond for each additional 25 fish they release. Congratulations to all.

Our next general meeting is June 4. Please join us.

Fishing the Corner

(Click on images to enlarge)

On Saturday, March 29, I was invited to fish aboard the Playtime, a 41 ft. Luhrs, with Captain Pat Price his mate Ian (not my brother), the owner, Mike (I don’t know his last name), and a few of his friends. We started out about 4:00 in the morning for the other side. Once we got there we moved around quite a bit and then got a triple header Wahoo. Around 2:00 a marlin came up in the spread and attacked the squid chains and took the mackerel off. He tried to eat Mike’s bait and then faded back to the squid chain and then to the left long. I was in the tower with Pat and he told me to go down and try to catch him. The left long was right there so I dropped back to him and hooked up. I fought him for about 35 minutes before releasing him. Pat estimated him to be about 250 lbs. It was a lot of fun and he was a beauty!
We then caught a few dolphin and two small tuna. It was a great day!

(Contributed by Jr. Anger Member Van Wichers)

Great Wahoo Fishing Off Walkers on Carolina Blues

This picture is a 70 # fish that was caught by Capt. Tred Barta fishing with us off of Walkers on February 23, 2008 aboard the Carolina Blues with Captain Billy Black, Craig (Bahamian deck hand), and Tred's wife Annie. We fished for two days and caught several nice Wahoo. Tred Barta filmed a show during these trips which will be appearing soon on his TV show "the best and worst of Tred Barta". We had a great trip, the Wahoo action is fantastic off Walkers right now.

(Contributed by Glen Snow)

New Board of Directors Member

(Pictured left of Dave & Joyce Powell are Don & Jackie Wilson.)

A warm welcome to Don Wilson as our newest member of the Board. Don and Jackie have been Club members for the past few years, and have been active in some of our tournaments and cruises. You've perhaps seen them around the Club or on their boat, the Coconut Express.

Fishing off Isla Mujeres

(Click on picures to enlarge)

Ian, Sky, Van and Tom Wichers were guests of Neil Subin on the new Outlaw, his 40'
Gamefisherman. The boat was docked at the marina at Puerto Isla Mujeres, a very nice facility that also offers hotel accommodations, restaurant and a large pool area. They fished 3 days and released 29 sails. But the real story was seeing the pods of sailfish balling bait. It often required a lot of searching to locate the pods, marked by frigate birds hovering overhead.

Fortunately there were a number of other Stuart based boats there as well, including the Bone Shaker and the Challenge, that provided a means to network by radio and locate the fish.
They fished the first week of March following the full moon and it seemed the main body of fish had migrated to the north. Earlier in the year the bite was "right out front"- their last day they finished 46 miles north of Isla.

Says Tom, "It was a great time and a pleasure to fish on a great boat with an expert crew and captain. Neil's passion for sailfishing shows with every opportunity and in their detailed preparation. Each day he located the main body of fish and produced as many or more bites than the other boats in the fleet."

They saw hundreds of fish and learned a healthy respect for the uniqueness of that fishery.
(Contributed by Tom Wichers)