Fishing For Sharks in Key West

This Black Tip Shark (all of his fins are tipped in black) is almost ready to be unhooked. With Black Tips, Lemons, Tigers and Bull Sharks all inhabiting the waters around Key West, there's plenty for the shark fishing enthusiast to enjoy

Key West is maybe not the first place that you'd think of when considering a shark fishing trip but there is some excellent shark fishing in the waters around Key West. The shallow inshore waters on the Gulf side, plus the waters around the Marquesas Islands are all home to huge numbers of sharks. These areas are very sheltered, many a windy day has been rescued by a day's shark fishing.

This video was taken whilst fishing aboard the light tackle boat "Outcast" in April 2008. It's amazing that such huge sharks are found in this very shallow water.

This hammerhead shark was pictured swimming around the "Permit Patch" looking for hooked permit to eat. I really wasn't interested in meeting hime close up

The favorite method is to anchor or drift, with a couple of barracuda hanging on a rope at the side of the boat. The scent trail builds up and in no time at all you'll see the dark shape of one or more marauding sharks following the scent towards the boat. Fishing is done with a fairly hefty rod and reel with a slab of barracuda or bonito on the hook.

These huge, brown, wrinkly fish are nurse sharks. They're BIG, which enables them to put up a bit of a fight but they're stupid and are quite likely to get themselves hooked several times in the same day. They don't have the speed or the ferocity of the other shark species and are known as the puppy dogs of the shark world...who'd harm a puppy dog ?

Most of the sharks (with one notable exception) put up a tremendous fight and they're always released to fight another day. That exception is the loveable nurse shark, a big brown lump of a fish that's so stupid that earlier this summer we had about a dozen of them milling around the boat taking turns at biting chunks out of the rubby dubby. Each time one was close enough we'd deliver a sharp prod with the blunt end of a boat hook. There'd be a thud as the wooden shaft hit him on the head, the shark would veer off and within a minute he'd be back again. Eventually we had no option but to move to another spot, we simply couldn't persuade those dopey creatures to move elsewhere.