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Posted by Toe on 21:21:46 07/18/12
I got invited to go swordfishing on a friend's boat today so I took up the offer. We left the dock at Matheson Hammock at 7:10 and headed straight to the swordfish grounds 17-18 miles off Miami. We spent the entire day in this area, so I was limited to seeing only the birds that were nearby. There were several flocks throughout the day inside and outside of us, with a few birds buzzing by the boat. Despite not chasing any birds, the day's bird list was pretty solid. I didn't take too many photos since only a few birds came close enough to photograph.
The day's list:
Cory's Shearwater (3)
Greater Shearwater
Audubon's Shearwater (12)
Wilson's Storm-Petrel (8)
Leach's Storm-Petrel
Band-rumped Storm-Petrel (2)
Brown Booby
Brown Noddy
Sooty Tern (100+)
Bridled Tern (8 ID'd, many Tern Sp at distance)
Pomarine Jaeger (2)
As to the fishing, we got only one bite on our third drift, a nice swordfish in the 350-400 lb range. It made two jumps 1,500 feet out from the boat, and after a 20 minute fight it pulled the hook while still 800 feet out. Seeing this fish jump was pretty impressive.
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