Busy week - mixed fishing

I've fallen off on my reports lately. Between fishing trips and other business, I haven't had a lot of time for updates... but there are updates to make! First of all, the Spanish mackerel have been a little finicky the past few trips. On our Kid's Fun Trip last Saturday, we couldn't seem to get rid of the bluefish long enough to get a Spanish on the line. That's not a bad problem to have, as the group was catching fish and they really weren't interested in bringing any home to eat. On Tuesday of last week, we ran a 3/4 day trip with Kyle and his boys. You couldn't have asked for a prettier day with calm seas and light winds almost all day long. This enabled us to run out 25-30 miles to hit some of our distant spots. Out there we were able to pick up a couple of mahi before the needlefish moved in. Needlefish can be fun to catch as they like to jump and run all over the place, but they're not for the table. They also tend to take over an area when they show up. As we were bringing one of the needlefish to the boat, something erupted underneath it and a huge barracuda came out and cut the fish clean in half. The 'cuda circled back to get the other half, and I was able to put a bait right in front of him. He struck and the fight was on. This barracuda must have thought he was part sailfish because he jumped and flipped and put on one heck of a battle before the young fisherman was finally able to haul him to the boat. We released the fish in the water (they smell really bad so I didn't want him on the deck), but I would estimate that big boy easily at 40 pounds. As usual around noon, the fishing started to slow. We hit a few more spots and then I suggested we go nearshore and see if the Spanish mackerel wanted to cooperate. We were technically out of time, but I thought I'd extend the trip at least long enough so the guys could catch enough to make a good dinner for the family. Fortunately, once we found a good school, we were able to sling several fish onto the ice. Our final trip on Thursday, another 3/4 trip ran into one challenge after another. The clients wanted mahi and maybe kings, and I figured we had pretty good odds based on the offshore conditions previously in the week. We got off to a great start with nice conditions for a run out to some ledges about 27 miles offshore. I had been watching the weather for a couple of days, but the forecast looked good after some early morning thunderstorms moved offshore. At first I thought the forecast was actually right, for once, but we had not been trolling long when I could see storm cells lining up across the horizon. We hoped they'd go on by, but when the wind and rain started to really pick up, I decided to try to run to another spot where radar showed clear skies. Unfortunately, these summer squalls come up fast, and by the time we reached the new location, more storms were surrounding us. With some lightning in the air, I made the call to run back close to shore and see if conditions were better there. It took a while, but as we got closer to the beach, the wind died down and it stopped raining. I put out the Clark Spoons for some Spanish, but we weren't having a lot of luck. We got into some small fish and some blues, but the big boys just weren't having any of it. The water was pretty murky and we had fairly heavy cloud cover, so I'm guessing they just weren't feeding heavily. We trolled about fifteen miles, picking up little Spanish and blues, as well as some unusually small false albacore (something I don't recall ever seeing before). At the end of the day I think everyone had a great time, along with the adventure of running before the storm. Everyone had the opportunity to reel in fish, even if the fish weren't really what we were hoping for. Some days are like that, though. As I've said before, if I could swim down and put a trophy on the hook for you, I would do it in a heartbeat. But it's a big ocean and fish have their own schedules. Like many captains, I'm pretty good at figuring them out, but sometimes Nature is just going to win.