VikingFleet
Seaman Apprentice
- Joined
- Jan 26, 2005
- Messages
- 39
04/20/05 American Red Snapper Season Opener<br />Gulf of Mexico, Tarpon Springs, Florida<br /> 
<br />The Viking Starship departed Wed night 04/20 to the Florida Middle Grounds for American Red Snapper and our usual catch of Grouper, Mangrove Snapper and Amberjack.<br /><br />The weather was perfect and the waxing moon had passengers and crew in Snapper bliss of some sort. The ninety mile ride was smooth and quiet to the first drop which provided us with some Red Snapper before the anchor line came tight; after a while the Mangrove Snapper started biting fairly decent.<br /><br />The rest of the trip was a hit or miss sort of thing. After making many moves during the day, we went to a wreck around 4pm, Red Snapper, Lane Snapper, Vermillion Snapper and Big Gag Grouper were on the menu. The Big Grouper was just over 27 lbs with many others coming over the rail. The Big Snapper of the trip was about 14lbs and the Large Amberjack was around 21 lbs. Tommy Pease, Jr, of Pinellas Park, FL won both the Grouper and the Snapper jackpots and Mickey Krause won the Amberjack pool with the very first fish she ever caught!!! Mickey and the rest of the group she was with had so much fun all 22 of them booked for next month.<br /><br />This trip was full of highs and slows, but over all we finished up with about 3,000 pounds of fish and a lot of smiles!
<br />The Viking Starship departed Wed night 04/20 to the Florida Middle Grounds for American Red Snapper and our usual catch of Grouper, Mangrove Snapper and Amberjack.<br /><br />The weather was perfect and the waxing moon had passengers and crew in Snapper bliss of some sort. The ninety mile ride was smooth and quiet to the first drop which provided us with some Red Snapper before the anchor line came tight; after a while the Mangrove Snapper started biting fairly decent.<br /><br />The rest of the trip was a hit or miss sort of thing. After making many moves during the day, we went to a wreck around 4pm, Red Snapper, Lane Snapper, Vermillion Snapper and Big Gag Grouper were on the menu. The Big Grouper was just over 27 lbs with many others coming over the rail. The Big Snapper of the trip was about 14lbs and the Large Amberjack was around 21 lbs. Tommy Pease, Jr, of Pinellas Park, FL won both the Grouper and the Snapper jackpots and Mickey Krause won the Amberjack pool with the very first fish she ever caught!!! Mickey and the rest of the group she was with had so much fun all 22 of them booked for next month.<br /><br />This trip was full of highs and slows, but over all we finished up with about 3,000 pounds of fish and a lot of smiles!