The large majority of amberjack are caught on live bait drifted near a reef, rock or wreck, but on some occasions, sight-fishing makes plenty of sense and offers fishermen a unique experience.
Shute, as is obvious by the name of his place of business, will break out a fly rod when the opportunity to drift a fly in front of an AJ presents itself. Kimrey loves the chance to get a big AJ to the surface to hit a big popping plug.
“If you want to catch one on a fly rod, the best thing to do is not chum,” Shute said. “When they just come up behind the boat, throw the fly to them. You might be able to chum up the first one or two, but if you keep chumming, they’ll turn off the fly and go back to the live bait.”
Shute said tackle needs to be stout. He advises using an 11- to 12-weight fly rod with a big reel and good drag system. He’ll fish mostly sinking fly lines and flies that are tied to imitate menhaden.
“You want a fly with a 4/0 hook; color doesn’t matter,” Shute said. “No flash — they just like duller-colored baits. You just tie a 4-inch baitfish fly with big eyes. They like big eyes. It’s pretty much a streamer, and you strip it back, but when they’re knotted up, you can just pitch it out and let it drift, and they’ll grab it.”
When it comes to topwaters, Kimrey likes a big plug, six to eight inches long.
“On days when you’ve got ‘em biting real good, you can take a big popper – Williamson makes one; you can use a Pencil Popper, and Tsunami makes a big topwater bait — and you can get ‘em to come up and hit it.
“The biggest problem is, when you cast it out there, you’ve got to crank it two times and really rip it, crank it and rip it,” he said. “You’ve gotta keep it wide open. If a fish is following it, you’ve got to really move it. People want to stop it when they see the fish following it, but if you do that, they’ll just swim away. The motion and the action is what brings ‘em in.”
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