Captain’s Corner: Dave Zalewski

The Tampa Bay Times

Dave Zalewski

The king is still coming. The Old Salt King of the Beach Spring Kingfish Tournament has been rescheduled for May 28,29 and 30. It was scheduled for this weekend but the restrictions caused by the virus pandemic forced the rescheduling. The spring migration of kingfish, sailfish, cobia, barracuda, and blackfin tuna started early this year and every indication was that this was going to be a banner year with all species being present. The popular belief is that all of these fish leave our waters and continue northward. This holds true for the smaller “schoolie” kingfish, but there are always some of the larger fish that remain in our area throughout the summer months and rejoin the southward migration in the fall. When bottom fishing in no matter what depth we always deploy stinger rigged flatlines in several ways. When using blue runners the use of a balloon will heplp to keep the bait away from the boat where it will try to seek shelter. A Spanish sardine or hardtail caught on site can be nose hooked, cast out, and allowed to swim freely. A frozen sardine is very effective because it will sink further down in the water column.
These resident fish will be found anyplace bait gathers and remains such as wrecks, artificial reefs and on the natural gas pipeline mitigation sites.
Even though the tournament will be held a month later, there will be plenty of fish available to allow someone to be crowned king