It’s that time of year again. Kingfish are here and if what we have caught already this Spring is any indication of what is to come, we’re gonna catch a lot of Kingfish. Our biggest so far has been 57" fork length and the best day as of March 13, 2000 has been 19 Kings boated. Kingfish have definitely bounced back in the past 3 years thanks to the 2 fish limit and reduced commercial fishing.

I had a call last night from a guy who wanted to know how I knew when to start fishing for Kingfish. This was a simple question to answer. I saw a Kingfish jump so I started fishing for Kingfish. Keep your eyes open while running and you will see them jumping. One day last Fall I saw a! t least a thousand jump between the Steel Tower and R#2 off the south end of Seahorse Reef near Cedar Key. We caught 53 that day on barbless hooks on 12# spinning tackle. In 1991 I caught exactly ONE Kingfish for the entire Fall run.

Here is how to cash in on this renewed Kingfish bounty.

TROLLING is, by far, the simplest and most effective way to catch Kingfish. Lots of lures will catch them but I rely on the 2 "M’s," METAL and MEAT. Metal Spoons such as the Huntington Drone and Captain Action are killers and have been for 50 or more years. Fish them on a short wire leader about 6 feet behind a 2-12 oz trolling sinker and it is hard to miss catching Kingfish. Run 4 lines with spoons and you are bound to catch limits. Here is how I troll spoons. On the Stbd. side I run the outside rig back about 40’ with a 8 oz. sinker and the inside rig back about 60’ with a 2 oz sinker. On the Port side I drop the outside lure back about 80’ with a 2 oz sinker and the inside back 30’ with a 12oz sinker. I seldom get a tangle but when I do, it can be a heck of a mess. When I get a hook-up, I put the boat into a turn to the opposite side the fish is hooked on. If you keep the ! boat moving, you often get more fish on. Hookups on all four rods will happen every day. Then there is bedlam.

As much as I like to fish spoons, I rely on MEAT when I gotta catch Kingfish. Feather dusters (Jap feathers) and rigged Cigar Minnows out fish everything else for sheer numbers of Kingfish. Hundreds of Florida Panhandle Charter Boat Captains seldom use anything else. This rig was used in Destin 50 years ago when there were only about 20 charter boats there. It caught fish then just as it does now. I use a blue and white or black and green feather duster on cloudy days and yellow or chartreuse on bright days. I always suggest using a Fairwater Tackle Minnow Troll rig behind the duster or learn how to rig the Destin "safety pin" rig. I use the "safety pin" rig myself because I have used it so many years and it works for me. Most tackle shops stock the Fairwater Minnow Troll or can get it quick. By all means use the single hook! version because it is much easier to get out of the fish if you are r eleasing them. Frozen Cigar Minnows are available at darn near all bait shops. Make sure you use only Cigar Minnows when trolling. Herring, Menhaden, and Sardines will twist. Ballyhoo troll well and catch a lot of Kingfish but require more rigging time and are much more expensive.

Keep a "pitch rod" ready with a short wire leader and a single hook. Kingfish often follow a hooked fish so a dead Cigar Minnow tossed out behind the boat while a fish is being landed often results in another hook-up. Live bait works too but the pitch rod with dead Cigar Minnows or Sardines gets lots of bites.

I never use lures or rigs with treble hooks for Kingfish. They are much too hard to get out of the fish safely both for fisherman and the fish. The SKA (Southern Kingfish Association) allows the use of treble hooks in their tournaments. If a Kingfish is caught on a live or dead bait with treble hooks, it w! ill be ineligible for an IGFA World Record because treble hooks are not allowed according to IGFA rules.

Kingfish are great smoked and just OK broiled. I’d rather have most any other fish fried so I keep about one per year for my consumption, releasing the rest.

A few words of CAUTION are in order here. Kingfish have lots of teeth and can mangle a hand or other body part in an instant. They are terribly slimy too and will make a dangerous, slippery mess on your deck. Kingfish are much more difficult to handle than a similar size Shark.

Remember: Life is too short to catch little fish!