Fishbuster Charters' Captain Dave Hanson reported, "Monday, April 1st, I fished offshore with frequent customer, Mike Connealy and his son-in-law, Brett Ewig. We headed out 33 miles west of New Pass, with shrimp and squid. There were some goliath grouper and sharks harassing some of our would-be catches, but we did well in spite of them. The guys caught five keeper mangrove snapper to 14 inches and released nine short mangs, along with a short yellowtail snapper. They added to the box two keeper lane snapper and ten nice keeper porgies to 23 inches. They released a dozen red grouper shorts to 18 inches, and also had a three-foot kingfish on the line for a bit, but it cut the line right at the boat.


George Sloan wanted to take his son and young grandchildren offshore Tuesday morning, 4/2, to fish for whatever the kids could catch. George, his son Rob, and grandchildren Logan, Lara and Max, used squid 19 miles west of New Pass to catch and box four good-sized grunts to 14 inches, and they released lots of blue runners, a 14-inch triggerfish, a red grouper short, and some tomtates and squirrelfish.


A weather front arrived overnight Tuesday, and winds were howling Wednesday morning, 4/3. The bay wasn’t a very good option, since the front caused dead low tides there, so Mike Gambino and his three friends decided to try the gulf. NOAA had forecast seas of two to three feet, but it was way rougher than that, with steady 4-footers and occasionally worse than that. We ventured no further than the local reefs off Bonita Beach. Fishing was tough, but the guys managed to catch eight grunts on squid—enough for fish tacos—and they released lots of blue runners.


Dr. Meir Daller and his son, Brenden, fished 34 miles west of New Pass with me on Saturday, 4/6. Fishing was kind of slow, at least for keepers, but the guys caught and released plenty of red grouper shorts to 18 inches—twenty of those. They did catch a nice keeper mangrove snapper at 16 inches, and one keeper lane snapper that was nearly 13 inches, along with four 12-inch grunts, all on squid."

1.) Angler Curt Claassen with a 17-inch porkfish, caught on shrimp 33 miles west of New Pass on a recent offshore Fishbuster Charter.





2.) Angler Kristen Leesman with an 20-inch snook, caught on shrimp and released in southern Estero Bay on a recent inshore Fishbuster Charter.