SouthMiamiBassMan

From my balcony, I saw four different schools of bass (with about 7, 2-6lbs fish in each) chasing the bluegills near shore on Sunday morning ;D. I was going to church so I couldn't go down > but I will go this weekend. I was about to give up on my lake, but now they are back and I can't wait!

Rg. fuzzy image: The resolution on your camera may not be set high enough.

in Miami back in the 80's, about 3 miles off of Key Biscayne, my uncle caught a "Square Grouper" one night. He had hooked a fish and as he was reeling it in he felt the pull get even stronger and we thought maybe a shark had eaten it so he slowly kept reeling it in and then noticed it was more of a dead weight then anything. When he got it to the boat we saw that the fish was a snapper and it had wrapped itself around a bail that was floating just beneath the surface. I was a kid and I didn't understand what was going on or why everyone was so out by it. Then my uncle pulled it in the boat started the engine and we went home right away. It wasn't until I got much older that my dad told me it was a few pounds of Jamaica's finest and because of it my uncle was able to upgrade to a much bigger boat. Like I said it was Miami in the 80's.

Down in Cutler Bay (south Miami) i see them coexisting just fine. More then once I have seen schools of LGM bass with a Peacock or two in them and vice versa.

There are pretty good sized LGM & Peacock bass in some of those lakes and they swim in schools together. I personally have only fished the large main lake off of Miller Drive. If you walk along the back end by the express way, there are a lot of fallen trees in the water that give them great cover. The only problems is that there is allot of branches in the water that makes it very difficult to fish from shore with out getting snagged. Go early by the sunrise. On one of the lakes you can rent paddle boats by the hour and you can probably sneak your gear on. I fished bluegills that I caught there and had some success. Good luck.

Yeah the lake is very big lake 30-40 ft deep. There is a shallow ring around it 2-3 ft deep, that goes out about 15 ft and the drops straight down. I can't get any thing out there from shore with out it getting snagged on the wall. I have attached the picture bellow so that you get a better idea. This image is old but the inlet I'm talking about is in the upper right.

Yeah, almost all the canals and lakes here connect all the way up to the Everglades.

Hello everyone. I have bad news, to share with you all (at least it is bad news for me I think). I'll start of by telling you a little history. I live in a condo on a lake down in Cutler Bay (South Miami) and from my window on the third floor I can see a really good part of the lake and all the fish in it. This part of the lake has a small inlet (canal) that's 60 yards long and 25 yards wide with a lot of tall weeds at the end of it. When I moved there in December 2006, this little inlet was packed with fish, Bluegills, Cichlids, Peacock, LGM Bass, and lots of Tilapia. There were so many hungry fish in there that from shore and with a live night crawler on a plastic bobber, I could catch them all of them, all day long. And I am not talking about little dinks here, I mean at least 5 or 6 1.5 ft long Bass (no scale) every time I went out and even more Tilapia of about the same size (all caught and released). The best part was the abundant supply of Bluegills and Cichlids. The Bass would school around in 6 packs and hunt the shallows, eating the Bluegills and Cichlids up all day long. When I started using these fish as bait I started catching Lunkers. I had a good run but since October, from my window, I never see any Bass except the occasional dink here and there. The Bluegills and Cichlid all but disappeared, and I have not caught anything worth taking my camera out or on most occasions none at all. My little inlet is no where near as busy with fish as it was this time last year. Even the Tilapia are not as abundant. I know it's suppose be winter down here but there has been no real cold front come down this year and the coldest it has been was 40' for like two days in January. Since then it has averaged around 75'. Like I said, this time last year the lake was packed. I don't know where they have all gone? I am the only one (as far as I can tell) fishing the lake. The Bluegills are back and there are thousand of them in the shallows. The Big Bass should be hunting them all up, but they are no where to be found. A few dinks are the only things down there now having a feast on the Bluegills. My questions to all of you are: Where could they have gone, will they be back, or should I just give up the on this lake all together? Let me know what you guys think. Thanks

Hello everyone. I have bad news, to share with you all (at least it is bad news for me I think). I'll start of by telling you a little history. I live in a condo on a lake down in Cutler Bay (South Miami) and from my window on the third floor I can see a really good part of the lake and all the fish in it. This part of the lake has a small inlet (canal) that's 60 yards long and 25 yards wide with a lot of tall weeds at the end of it. When I moved there in December 2006, this little inlet was packed with fish, Bluegills, Cichlids, Peacock, LGM Bass, and lots of Tilapia. There were so many hungry fish in there that from shore and with a live night crawler on a plastic bobber, I could catch them all of them, all day long. And I am not talking about little dinks here, I mean at least 5 or 6 1.5 ft long Bass (no scale) every time I went out and even more Tilapia of about the same size (all caught and released). The best part was the abundant supply of Bluegills and Cichlids. The Bass would school around in 6 packs and hunt the shallows, eating the Bluegills and Cichlids up all day long. When I started using these fish as bait I started catching Lunkers. I had a good run but since October, from my window, I never see any Bass except the occasional dink here and there. The Bluegills and Cichlid all but disappeared, and I have not caught anything worth taking my camera out or on most occasions none at all. :'( My little inlet is no where near as busy with fish as it was this time last year. Even the Tilapia are not as abundant. I know it's suppose be winter down here but there has been no real cold front come down this year and the coldest it has been was 40' for like two days in January. Since then it has averaged around 75'. Like I said, this time last year the lake was packed. I don't know where they have all gone? I am the only one (as far as I can tell) fishing the lake. The Bluegills are back and there are thousand of them in the shallows. The Big Bass should be hunting them all up, but they are no where to be found. A few dinks are the only things down there now having a feast on the Bluegills. My questions to all of you are: Where could they have gone, will they be back, or should I just give up the on this lake all together? :-/ Let me know what you guys think. Thanks

I call them "african" because that is what one of the Websites i used to identify them when I first caught them called it.

Thanks guys. I've been trying to catch one of these for the past two years. They are not easy to catch but well worth the trouble.

Nice Hogs. I cheat all the time with live shiners from the shop or blue gills I catch off shore . It will always produce the the big bass. What's your method? Do you use a floater, free lined, or with a sinker?

Hey everyone, it's been a while since I had something worth posting and now I finally do. My buddy Eric picked me and brother in law up for some fishing on Saturday. He had been to this lake near my house and said he saw Peacock bass schooling in it. He had tried everything in his tackle box but none were biting. So we went to my neighborhood bait shop and picked up some live shiners to use for bait. Well ten minutes into it Eric catches his first one that was hiding under a bush. Darted right out once the shiner hit the water. It was a good start but after that we there was nothing for almost an hour. The LGM Bass were very picky and would not go anywhere near our shiners. We walked around the lake, throwing in here and there with no success until we reached the south western part of the lake. We found 3 huge boulders in about 16 ft of water and under them was a school of about 10 Peacock Bass. I threw in my 2 1/2 in shiner hooked in the upper lip out past them and reeled it slowly back to shore. It caught the attention of a bull and he went right after it. I thought LGM bass put up a fight but these suckers are strong! He went nuts when I set the hook, swimming in every direction. I kept my line tight until I got him to shore. He was a beauty. I called him a bull because he had what looked like a horn coming out of its forehead. To my surprise it was actually a bubble. Also, they are not easy to lip as their teeth are sharper and their jaws are much stronger then a LGM. Right after this pic. he clamped down on my thumb so hard I dropped him. (He was ok though) We didn't get another bite after that but it we left smiling. ;D

We left the scale in the car but I would guesstimate 4.5 - 5.5 lbs. They are thick like footballs.

There are pretty much in every canal or lake south of West Palm Beach were the water is warmer. In some bodies of water (down south) there are more of them then there are LGM Bass. They can be more difficult to catch then regular bass because you will not always see them, they will analyze the bait before going for it, and will only eat a certain times of the day. Once I had a live shiner swim up to one and actually go up into the Peacocks mouth! The peacock just spit it out, look at it for a few seconds, and then just swam off! I have never seen them go after anything that didn't have a heartbeat.

Hey everyone, it's been a while since I had something worth posting and now I finally do. My buddy Eric picked me and brother in law up for some fishing on Saturday. He had been to this lake near my house and said he saw Peacock bass schooling in it. He had tried everything in his tackle box but none were biting. So we went to my neighborhood bait shop and picked up some live shiners to use for bait. Well ten minutes into it Eric catches his first one that was hiding under a bush. Darted right out once the shiner hit the water. It was a good start but after that we there was nothing for almost an hour. The LGM Bass were very picky and would not go anywhere near our shiners. We walked around the lake, throwing in here and there with no success until we reached the south western part of the lake. We found 3 huge boulders in about 10 ft of water and under them was a school of about 10 Peacock Bass. I threw in my 2 1/2 in shiner hooked in the upper lip out past them and reeled it slowly back to shore. It caught the attention of a bull and he went right after it. I thought LGM bass put up a fight but these suckers are strong! He went nuts when I set the hook, swimming in every direction. I kept my line tight until I got him to shore. He was a beauty. I called him a bull because he had what looked like a horn coming out of its forehead. To my surprise it was actually a bubble. Also, they are not easy to lip as their teeth are sharper and their jaws are much stronger then a LGM. Right after this pic. he clamped down on my thumb so hard I dropped him. (He was ok though) We didn't get another bite after that but it we left smiling. ;D

Mayan Cichlid. They are nasty little buggers. They are from the Amazon and can be found every were in south FLA. They have small mouths with sharp teeth and sharp spinal fins. When I am trying to catch big bass I sometimes use live bluegills or shiners for bait. These suckers will come up to the live bait and just bite the heads clean off, and then just leave the rest of the fish! > Now I am left with a dead headless bait (that a bass wont go near), and they never come back to finish the job.

You might want try the Cutler Bay area. We've got plenty of lakes and canals around here that have Peacocks & LGM Bass. In my lake I saw one regularly a few months ago that I was always trying to catch with no luck. I hadn't seen him for about 4 months so I thought somebody must have caught him. But this past weekend I saw him just as I was packing up to leave and he must of grown about 6 inches, he was huge (about 25+ inches!) They can be very finicky eaters. I had a live shinner once and tossed it out in front of him and the shinner actually swam directly towards the PB's mouth. He looked at it and spit it water at it and swim away. Now that it's back I'm gonna keep an eye out for it and see if he will go for a live blue gill.

Yeah it is. My lake has tons of African (black in color) and the Blue ones. When they are breeding they become really blue.

Tilapia are back and ready to begin bedding I think. These fish are more of a nucense to me for three reasons. 1: They have small mouths in comparison to there body so if I am not using really small hooks, they can pick the bait right off. 2: They are no where near as fun fishing because they have no fight in them they strugle for 5 seconds and then give up. 3: When they begin bedding they are very territorial and will chase off any bass that do come by >. Well it is better then nothing. I caught 4 on Sunday with a pretty big one on my last cast. I was using live night crawlers for bait.

Very intresting story. I would love see these pics but nothing is showing up on your post. Please re post the pictures of Freak fish. :-?

In the begining of the year I caught this 32 & 1/4 inches long (no scale ). LMB on a live blue gill. I was alone and couldn't get the camara positioned correctly to get the whole fish and this horrible picture is all I have to show for it. I still see her every once in awhlie cruising the lake and have re caught her twice since but both tlme she shook off the hook before I had her up to shore. :'( She is thinner now after she spawned but she still a biggy!

Very Nice! Congrats

Thats a nice bass buddy, what ever size it was.