Anglers Journal

Eighty to 100 miles out, where the canyons lie at the edge of the continental shelf, warm-water eddies spinning off the Gulf Stream meet the colder, plankton-rich waters of the North Atlantic. That’s where the squid and halfbeaks hang, out along the

Islamorada, Fla., is my favorite place in the whole world. It’s where I hunt 100-pound tarpon with light tackle — an 11-weight G. Loomis fly rod and Tibor reel. Fighting a tarpon is epic. The first time I saw a monster tarpon ripping offline, jumping

They call me “Crazy Alberto,” not because I’m crazy in the head but because I have a passion for fishing. Why else would I perch on a boulder the size of a VW — at night — in November, with the surf washing around my waders and a cold northeast wind

I’ve spent my life fishing for snook. The greatest thing about it is you do it early in the morning or late at night, far from the madness of the interstates. You see the sunrises, the birds, the vegetation, the fish popping in the solitude of the Ev

When you’re young, you think its just about the fish — the most, the largest, the strongest, the farthest afield. As you get a bit older, you discover its about that and more, such as the company you choose. For this venture onto the water, we’d like

It's been a long time coming, but a red snapper reallocation amendment Is under consideration by the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council and could potentially recast the way the fishery is divided between recreational and commercial interests.

The sun was almost down when Jack called out. “I’m on,” he said, and I watched him lean back as the fish turned and made its first run. Jack is 13, an age when he seems to grow about an inch each month, and now he was showing a newfound proficiency w

After a lifetime of wresting a living from coastal waters, Capt. Bruce Borges possesses the skills of successful watermen the world over. He has eyes in the back of his head; he reads the water with the ease of a prodigy devouring a musical score; an

Bill Curtis literally grew up with a fly rod in his hand, but in 1948 he moved to Miami and found a passion that changed his life and the future of fly-fishing. He began traveling west along the Tamiami Trail, fly-casting for snook and baby tarpon, a

His is an authentic voice from another era, from a time when Cuttyhunk, Mass., was an epicenter of striped bass fishing. In its heyday, two dozen charter boats worked out of the fish dock on this westernmost high spot in the Elizabeth Island chain, w

I lay on the surface moving quietly through the clear shallows in 3 to 5 feet of water. Something caught my eye, and I swung my head to the left and heard my breath in the snorkel. It was nothing, a cloud shadow moving on the bottom. Still, I knew th

On the surface fishing is a primitive activity. I mean in the anthropological sense that fishing is included in the hunting and gathering activities of our remote ancestors. It is all about filling the tummy. In a decidedly comic sense it is hard to

The sky was gray, the water was black, the glaciers were blue, and the mountains in the distance were white. It was a typical midsummer day in southeast Alaska, and it provided a perfect medium for my first encounter with the mighty king salmon. I wa

There are two places in the world that offer reasonably reliable black marlin bites. One is the Great Barrier Reef, and the other is the west coast of Panama. Unless you’re in the mood for an epic flight for an epic fight, Panama City, which is a sho

Some prefer their tuna fighting mightily at the end of a line rather than dangling limp and lifeless at the end of a pair of chopsticks. Despite heavy food-fishing pressure on the giant bluefin and deep declines in populations, an epic battle with on

Its funny — no, odd, really — because fishing has such a wide range of effects or lack thereof, depending on who you are and perhaps your genetic makeup. And on the other hand, it completely ignores genetics. Let me explain. First off, millions — per

They’re doing amazing things with synthetics these days. Plastics and nylons, polymers and more, they can come pretty close to emulating the feel and texture of what occurs in nature. But when it comes to enticing game fish to bite, there’s something

Legend has it that one of the first sportfishing boats was built in California. Crete was built with a “deep cockpit, a special chair to fish from and leather rod holders.” That boat was used in California for about a year and then shipped to Hawaii

The boats reserved for Capt. Mitchell and me were quite different from any we had ever used. They were close to 40 feet in length, and 11 or 12 feet in beam. The cockpits were deep, so deep that we had to build platforms upon which to mount the fishi

Sportfishing has made amazing strides in techniques and technologies that have let anglers catch ever more and larger fish. But nothing has advanced the sport faster than design developments in the boats we fish from. The early masters of the sport,

The biggest fish roam far-flung waters, which can take a real commitment to reach. Long passages to the fishing grounds, boats capable of safely making the voyage, and large fuel supplies all enter into the equation. Then there’s the fishing: What ar

Please know that first and foremost I am a lifelong angler who loves nothing more than spending a day on the water in pursuit of big fish. It’s my passion and my profession, and I live it practically every day of the year. I am also a dedicated conse

It’s funny the way we end up, in adulthood, fighting for the honor of things we flat-out detested as kids. I think now of creamed onions. They were a carry-over from Mom’s mom. I became quite adept at hiding these little semitranslucent orbs of pure

Ineeded a bigger boat to expand my horizons. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? But how was I going to talk my wife, Cindy, a longtime sailor, into it? To top it off, I bought the boat over the phone, sight unseen. I told Cindy it was an “awesome” deal. “A