Sailfishing spread on a small skiff

Matthew George: I think out of the hundred fish that we caught, 10 of them were dead bait. So, Dead bait trolling on a little eight, six beam or something. You just pull one big strip dredge down the middle, and we just prospect that dredge and you get your bites, but it's definitely not like the big boat that's for sure. We don’t even have those small outriggers, no outriggers, at all. So we'll pull the dredges just off a rod tip. I got a big Tarpon spinning rod that I use, I just pull it right off of the tip of the big spinner rod.

Leo Chapman: I thought you were gonna say an 80 wide tiagra.

Matthew George: I started with a 50 wide, but it just got to be too much. After I built my big dredge and figured out that I didn't need weight, it worked out well. I actually put a float on my dredge, which I know a lot of people think is crazy. But when I am bump trolling on really slow days, I could pull the boat out of gear and the dredge will just float a foot or two below the surface. When the sailfish come in to check out the dredge, the next thing they see is the next Bait around and they're eating it. 

SkipJack: We'll pull a little striptease with a little fender or something floated. Keep it up there. It works well. A lot of guys don't realize, when they're bump trolling, as soon as they pull their boat out of gear, their dread just sinks down.

Matthew George: I know some of my buddies like to put their dredges a little deeper, I want to see what's going on. On the skif you're flat on the water. I can only imagine what I miss this past year, I was able to run an Island Maratha that had a tower and I got to really see just how many fish I've actually missed over the years without being able to see what's going on back there. It's been pretty cool. But the dredge works. Obviously when we're dead bait trolling we're not pulling a float on there, sometimes we have to put weight on it, depending on what kind of sea conditions we have. But we fish three lines and that's it. Bump trolling is what we prefer for sailfishing on the skif.

You can listen to the full conversation here on EP19 


Blog Team