July 2024 - Gulf Coast Fly Fishing School

Makos in San Diego

Mako Shark By Thomas R. Dempsey, M.D. CCI

Well, my travel partner Chris and I just got back from a fabulous trip to San Diego to fish for Mako sharks with Conway Bowman, only Conway was down with his back, so we inherited his partner, Greg Stutzer. What an experience. I’ve never been with a guide that is more knowledgeable, who is more helpful, who is more into it with his clients than Greg. We really lucked out.

We spent 3 days off of Dana Marina about 9-10 miles out fishing for Mako sharks.

Now if you really want to do something different, this is the trip to take. They have a very unique way of catching these beasts, that probably violates every rule of the FFI Casting instructors.

First, there are no commercially made fly fishing rods big enough to handle these, so they make their own. These are equivalent to a 16 or 17 weight rod. The line has 80 lb. cast core and the leaders are 60-80 lbs., some of them even 100 lbs., connected to a bite tip of 105 lb. test straight wire. The hooks are 8/0 or 10/0. You talk about big flies, the ones they use stretch from about your elbow to your fingertips. There is no false casting of these babies. The technique requires throwing the fly in the water behind you, with no slack, and then water-hauling over your head with 2 hands out front. The longest cast that you will make is 45-50 feet.

The sharks are chummed up with blocks of fish guts and other unknown materials placed in a heavy plastic basket and attached to the side of the boat. A pink piece of PVC pipe is used like a mortar and pestle, to break up the chum which creates a large slick. The sharks come up in the chum line and that’s when you get on. It requires a special way of hooking these fish so they don’t bite through the leader. This entails throwing to the side or behind them so they will rip around and grab it and hook themselves in the side of the mouth. A straight on shot is a disaster. They will chomp right through it. Once hooked it is game on.

I was able to catch one that weighed well over 500 pounds and Chris got one close to that. We also had the opportunity to see a 1000-pound shark that appeared to be bigger than the entire boat. In addition to the Makos we caught blue sharks. They were everywhere and very easy to catch.

After spending 3 days on the water catching sharks, you understand what the top of the feeding chain is. For a unique experience head out to San Diego and hook up with one of these guys.

The Triple Tail Classic 2024

Events

The Triple Tail Classic is now in the history books. This is the 5^th consecutive year that this event has been held as a tag and release challenge for triple tail that benefits the Gulf Coast Research Lab. This year there were over 38 boats with over 90 anglers that participated. They came from Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas and Georgia. The event encompassed an area from Pensacola Bay to Biloxi beginning at 7am on Saturday morning and ending at 4pm. There were multiple categories for first fish caught, the most fish, the biggest fish, and the overall grand champion based on the lowest number of points.

I am proud to say that the Gulf Coast Fly Fishing team of founder Thomas Dempsey and his son Todd Dempsey tied for first overall for the grand championship which was awarded on a tie-breaker, bumping GCFF into second place. That being said, the event was considered a huge success. The Gulf Coast team was tied for first place and actually lost on a small technicality. But everyone had fun and the Gulf Coast team caught 4 fish out of a total of 36 triple tails that were caught during the tournament. All the fish were tagged for a research project that the Gulf Coast Research Lab supports as an ongoing project for the health and sustainability for the triple tail species.

“Thanks” should be giving to Noble and Danelle Davidson for their continuing support and production of this tournament. They work hard every year to make sure the tournament comes off smoothly. Despite living in Apalachicola, FL, Danelle’s and Noble’s tireless participation ensures that this is one of the best, if not the best, fishing tournaments that I have ever been associated with. Kudos to both of them.

Saturday evening finished with a band, Moe’s BBQ, the presentation of awards and the congratulations of all the participants and volunteers. The Gulf Coast Fly Fishing club looks forward to participating next year and we’ll see you on the water!