Wednesday May 30th was our first day of tagging off Isla Mujeres. Seas were 5 ft to 7 ft with a few waves up to 10 ft. Nevertheless we had an excellent day fishing with 28 dolphin tagged. We also caught 4 sailfish and one white marlin. We are fishing the reef edge in water 170-250 ft deep. Water temperature is 83.5 degrees with little variation. There is a strong current moving to the North so we just zigzag back and forth and try to keep the waves from breaking over the transom. Most of the tagged dolphin were less than 20" in length. We did catch two fish over 30 lbs. Getting those fish to the boat with the waves and current was a major effort on 20 lb tackle. We fished for 8 hours, covered 65 miles according to the GPS tracks and only fished a small section of the reef line. Soon as the waves drop out we will move further North and explore some large reef lines plus move out in deeper water around the Aerosmith Bank.

We plan to be here 3 weeks and I can already tell we will not have time to explore every major fishing area. There are pods of whale sharks in the area, large mako sharks on the prowl plus spectacular deep drop opportunities for grouper and snapper. We will also move over to Isla Contoy and Isla Holbox to explore the flats fishing for tarpon, permit and bonefish. We will tag everything we catch to help scientist understand migration patterns and support conservation efforts.

The Yucatan Straits between Mexico and Cuba is the major gateway to the Gulf of Mexico and Gulf Stream moving up through the Florida Straits. With the major upwelling zones, the bait fish and predators all congregate here to feed. We will try to document the ecosystem and share it with you on this blog. We will post more pictures soon. Best to all.

Isla Mujeres at last

We made the 334 mile run from Key West to Isla Mujeres arriving on Tuesday, May 29. The Makara left Key West at 1pm on Monday and made the run in under 20 hours. We ran with a 20 kt following wind into the Gulf Stream, where seas were 6-8 feet for much of the way. One lighting storm at 4am was the highlight of the trip. After a half a day to clear customs, immigration and get fishing permits, we are finally ready to begin tagging.

We will explore the fishing grounds today looking for feeding birds from the 170 foot line out to 250 feet. There seas are still pretty rough so we will wait another day to fish the Aerosmith Bank which is 20 miles offshore. Captain Ben from the Guarimba will join us today. He has been fishing here for 3 weeks and knows where the fish have been biting. So pictures, tag reports and stories will appear here later today. Best to all today.

Weather delay - Wind!

We had planned to leave on May 22 from North Palm Beach and head to Key West then across the Gulf of Mexico to Isla Mujeres. Reports from Isla are excellent - chance at a grand slam, 30 lb dolphin everywhere and great weather. But we have 6-8 ft seas here and the conditions are forecasted to last through the weekend. We use the Navy weather model forecast results from www.fnmoc.navy.mil. They provide an unclassified 7 day forecast for the North Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico. Shown above is the Gulf forecast for May 26.

We will sit tight, wax and polish the boat and keep watching the weather. Check back - I will try to tell more about the Isla Mujeres ecosystem in the next few days.

Yucatan Straits Tag Expedition

Our next tagging expedition is a trip to the Yucatan Straits where we will be tagging dolphin and white marlin for a month. Don Hammond will be with us again as we attempt to tag 200 dolphin in order to better understand dolphin migration out of the Caribbean up through the Florida Straits to the Eastern Seaboard. No one has ever tagged dolphin this far South (and West).

We plan to leave May 22nd from North Palm Beach Marina and run first to Key West. We will sit there until we have good weather then do an overnight run to Isla Mujeres. Isla is 400 miles SW from Key West so we will leave late afternoon, run ful speed until dark. Then we slow down to 10 knots, turn on the infrared vision system and carefully run until morning. We should be at Isla Mujeres by mid-morning the following day.

We will be reporting the results of our tagging efforts daily along with pictures of other marine life in the area. This is a major feeding ground for whale sharks that feed in the upwelling zone beyond the Arrowsmith Bank. We have gotten reports of pods of 50+ whale sharks on the surface feeding. We will definitely put on our snorkle gear, grab our underwater cameras and jump in and document any encounter.

More later on preparing for a month at sea. Tag and release.

925 miles of fishing

We have completed three successful tagging trips in the past four months on the Makara. The boat logged over 925 miles of fishing and tagged over 169 dolphin and one wahoo, and caught blue marlin, white marlin, wahoo and bonefish as part of our expanding conservation effort. The data above represents our fishing effort on these trips and tells us not only where we caught fish, but where we did not. With our expanding data collection and access to SST, current, tide and weather conditions, we can know look back and analyze where the fish were present and where they were absent. Our next step is to update the Makara electronics software to automatically record much of our research effort and be able to analyze it in near-real time.

The Google image above details when and where we fished, what we caught and what we saw at sea. We track sightings of frigate and tuna birds, bait balls and marine mammals. Our goal is to understand the complete ecosystem in order to add knowledge and understanding. Conservation works best when based on solid science. With expeditions planned for the Yucatan Straits in June and the Southern Caribbean this Fall, we should add valuable data to help manage these fisheries.

Email us if you want to know more or get involved. We can be reached at tag@mvftag.com. We also have a new tag reporting website at www.mvftag.com. It will be updated soon to allow interactive analysis of where the fish are and are not, based on fishing effort and environmental conditions. It's exciting work. Get involved.

125 dolphin tagged in one day!

The crew of the Makara tagged 125 dolphin today. We started out slow on a weed line just outside the Chub Cay marina. But we dialed in the radar and found the birds -- the frigates, the schools of flying fish, and dolphin... everywhere. We've never seen so many dolphin stacked up in the back of the Pocket, 15 miles west of Chub Cay. We were on fish for four solid hours and never moved more than 1/4 mile from the edge. To top it off, Joe released a nice white marlin as we were heading back to the dock.

We have refined our tagging technique to get the fish in the boat, tagged, and back in the water quickly. 125 dolphin in four hours of fishing means we tagged a dolphin every two minutes! It was truly an all-hands-on-deck experience. We broke two tag sticks, rebuilt them, chopped 10 lbs of Humbolt squid wings for chum and were covered in blood and fish goo by the afternoon. I have not had a better day on the water. You should have seen the smiles on everybody when we tagged the 125th dolphin.

The most significant accomplishment today was for conservation -- it is really up to us, the anglers, to protect our fisheries and oceans. To do this, we all must all play a part. Tagging is the first step to building the base of scientific knowledge to better manage the dolphin fishery. In the end, we cannot rely on NGOs, state DNRs or NMFS to protect the fish. We can do it ourselves. Get involved. Make a stand. Do it now.

19 dolphin tagged off Chub Cay 4/7/07

We had our best tagging day of the season today off the North wall of the Pocket, five miles off Chub Cay. We heard there had been a good marlin bite in the previous couple days, so we dropped the riggers right off the edge of the flats. The dolphin were in tight and plentiful. We tagged 19 fish in 3 separate blitzes. We had 3-4 fish hooked up at a time with only two anglers. Captain Steve and Billy took turns tagging with the modified billfish foundation tag stick. We tagged all but one dolphin in the water. It just takes too much time to haul them in the boat and hand tag them. The bite was over by 10AM, so we headed over to Joulters to look for billfish. Had one white marlin come up on the pink squid teaser: Billy quickly dropped a hoo in front of his face but he swam off. We put three dolphin in the box and grilled one for dinner. It had pink flesh and was awesome.

We also attempted to tag more bonefish one day. A front was blowing through with wind and rain. Even with no sun, we saw fish but could not get a hookup. We will try again today to catch and tag more bonefish.

More news tomorrow.