1-20-13 Islamorada fishing in January

January fishing in Islamorada has been pretty active on the reef the past few days. The Cheeca Lodge sailfish tournament took place on Friday and Saturday and the Bud n Mary's boys were right in the mix after the first day. The Reel McCoy was leading with 6 releases Friday and both the Catch 22 and Predator had 5 releases. On Saturday they got off to a slow start but at the end the day the Reel McCoy was tied for 1st place , but finished in 2nd place based on time with 9 releases overall. Congrats capt George! Today the islamorada winter fishing was a mixed bag for the offshore boats. The catch 22 hit the sails early and released 5. The Kalex released 2 and also had a big blackfin tuna and a couple king mackerel. The finnster had a handful of kings including a big 30 lb smoker and 15 yellowtail snapper. The BnM had 15 yellowtails, a couple kingfish, a couple short cobra and a few barracuda. The relentless caught some yellowtails in the morning, then had a few slow hours after that. But they never gave up and on the way home hit a nice school of cobia, keeping 3 nice ones to 35 lbs! The Fearless did half day reef trips today and had snapper and mackerel as well. The cloud nine had a big 46 lb wahoo today too. Book your Florida keys offshore fishing trip soon!