In this conversation, Mike Calabrese discusses his history and experience in fisheries throughout the globe. He explains the technique of kite fishing in South Florida and the importance of bait culture. Mike also discusses the sailfish migration and their preferences for different types of bait. In this conversation, Mike Calabrese discusses the differences between kite fishing and trolling for sailfish, highlighting the advantages and challenges of each method. He also explains the impact of seaweed and grass on fishing success and the relationship between seaweed and baitfish. Mike shares insights on water clarity, cold weather, and its effect on fishing. He delves into the technique of hooking a fish while kite fishing and the importance of angles. Additionally, the conversation discusses teaser fishing and the importance of quality dredges. Mike then introduces Firetailz, which offers lightweight and durable artificial dredge baits for fishing.

Videos by Dave Collier

https://www.firetailz.com/

Instagram:

https://www.instagram.com/fire_tailz?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet&igsh=ZDNlZDc0MzIxNw==

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TRANSCRIPT

Katie (00:03 .18)

What's up you guys? Welcome to the KDC Sawyer podcast. I'm your host Katie and today I'm sitting with Mike Calabrese. Mike, thank you so much for joining us. Where are you sitting in from?

Mike Calabrese (00:15 .719)

Hey, Katie, glad to be here. I am at my home today in Jupiter, Florida, South Florida.

Katie (00:21 .838)

Is that where you're from originally?

Mike Calabrese (00:24 .327)

Somewhat, I'm from a little further south, Pompano Beach, Broward County, and my work and stuff on boats had brought me up this way the last few years, so decided to call Jupiter home.

Katie (00:36 .524)

Jupiter is a really, really pretty place. What's your experience? Give us a little bit of rundown of your fishing history, your experience in the field.

Mike Calabrese (00:40 .071)

Great town.

Mike Calabrese (00:47 .268)

Oh boy, okay. So growing up in South Florida, obviously near the water, fishing was always a thing as a kid. Started out freshwater, bass fishing in the canals where I grew up. And then that elevated into my buddy's dad was in a boat rental club. We used to take a boat out and go catch mahi. And then I went to a high school where I met some friends with boats and that led to...

some tournament fishing with some friends from high school, which we got pretty good at, and ultimately took up work on boats in my early 20s, kind of undecided as to a career, had a connection on a boat, and the rest is history. Never look back.

Katie (01:32 .879)

So you're fishing, you're fishing with predominantly southern Florida for a good chunk of your early years, correct? Or your early in the industry years.

Mike Calabrese (01:42 .947)

Yep, that's right. I worked for a program that we pretty much did South Florida kite fishing and then we go to Key West a lot. But mostly Florida before a new job and taking on some travel in my mid -20s after the first job I had which is mostly South Florida based.

Katie (02:02 .832)

Where did you go once you started traveling?

Mike Calabrese (02:06 .469)

Um, so after the first job, I went to school to get my captain's license. I met a fellow there, uh, who was also a fisherman. We became friends in class. And, uh, after this class, uh, he reached out, asked me if I wanted to help deliver a boat, um, from Stewart to Panama, I believe. And, um, I had nothing else going on. I said, sure, let's do it. And, um, met a captain there. It was an American custom yacht. Uh, had a good trip.

ended up going back for another delivery which brought me from Costa Rica to Cabo San Lucas where I ended up meeting another boat that was in need of a crewman and that was a boat called the Patriot, a big 80 foot Monterey, Captain Terry Stancil and his wife Bonnie and the timing was right there. I met them in Cabo San Lucas and came back a little while later to start my work there for several years I worked on the Patriot.

That was a great learning experience, great program. Fished the Gulf of Mexico and then eventually we towed the boat with a mothership across the Pacific down to Tahiti onto the Kingdom of Tonga and then New Zealand was the distance of that travel. It was a very outstanding trip, yeah.

Katie (03:26 .707)

That's so cool. That's amazing. Okay. So when did you start in Cava with Patriot? Like, what year?

Mike Calabrese (03:37 .67)

That would have been probably around 2005, 2006? Yep.

Katie (03:44 .147)

And so, what were you fishing there? Were you fishing like the finger bank, Gordo? What were you fishing in Cabo?

Mike Calabrese (03:49 .894)

I had missed the big striped marlin season there up the way there at Mag Bay. They had done it previously before I got there. I was actually there for a little while and then we brought the boat back to the Gulf of Mexico that summer. We caught some striped marlin out front, but never the big number stuff that folks are seeing now.

Katie (04:09 .94)

Were you... Was that your first exposure to like marlin fishing?

Mike Calabrese (04:15 .237)

Uh, somewhat. Um, I did have a stint with a friend of mine who, uh, family had a boat and I second mated that, uh, in St. Thomas for a season, which was another great learning experience, blue marlin fishing in St. Thomas. Uh, but other than that, yeah, I had minimal, minimal marlin experience until that point.

Katie (04:35 .541)

So the St. Thomas Marlin fishery is pretty, I've never done it myself, but it's like, I don't want to say rat blues, but like small blue marlin, correct? Like kind of similar to Costa Rica or am I off?

Mike Calabrese (04:45 .477)

Huh?

No, St. Thomas is actually known for bigger average quality size fish. Probably 250 to 500 is, you know, but it gets a little rougher there. The fish are angry there. They're very aggressive. Good average size fish, probably average three plus and aggressive and good teaser bites and people love it there for the angry fish. And it would be probably starting in June, but it seems...

Katie (04:55 .158)

Okay.

Katie (05:11 .095)

What's the season in St. Thomas?

Mike Calabrese (05:17 .701)

you know, a little later, the best times I would say would be August, September, October, perhaps lately. Late summer. Mm -hmm.

Katie (05:23 .704)

Nice. Super cool. So, man, I hadn't realized that you were towed on a mothership across the Pacific Ocean. That's a story for another time. I'm going to try not to focus on that because I have a million other questions I want to ask you. But you kind of you caught me off guard. You blew me away there a little bit. But OK, cool. So growing up in South Florida, you were doing the now you mentioned the kite fishing. That's something that.

Mike Calabrese (05:38 .413)

Yeah, okay.

Katie (05:53 .081)

I actually didn't know even was a thing until well after I had started kite fishing for Yellowfin Tuna in the Pacific with Artificial. And I came in, this is for the listener, I came into, back to the Gulf of Mexico and was starting to work with an organization that had me in South Florida for a little while and I called Mike up and I was like, hey, I need to understand this kite fishing industry. Like, why are we?

why are we flying kites for sailfish and why only here? So Mike, can you give us some some insight on that?

Mike Calabrese (06:31 .268)

Yeah, so I mean, I certainly didn't invent it or anything like that. I guess down in Miami in the 1950s or so, a fellow figured out how to build and fly a kite and dangle some baits from it with release clips. Basically in South Florida, it's kind of a function of our geography. We have a very steep drop off off the coast. It drops off pretty quick. Therefore the lane that the fish

tend to hang out and travel in is quite narrow. So for example, typical sailfish depth here, a lot of places, call it 100 to 200 feet of water. As you get down to South Florida, it's a fairly tightly compressed lane. With that being said, trolling can be difficult to stay in that area, to maximize your fishing in that lane. This fella,

I know Bob Lewis was one of the first guys to build a kiter. Those are the first kites from Miami there. Great idea. What it does is it enables you to, almost like an outrigger, get multiple baits away from the boat and also fish them on the surface of the water where sailfish like to come up and feed. It's very visual. You get to see the bite often. It's a fun way to fish. It's pretty efficient. Yeah, it's a fun way to fish.

Katie (07:57 .821)

That's cool. So what you guys are doing is you're using the kites to put the baits in a very specific area because there's only a small surface area where these fish are most likely going to be congregating and feeding.

Mike Calabrese (08:13 .636)

Right, so, you know, that's the thing about any fishing is you never exactly know where the fish are gonna be as far as depth of water, location. But basically we'll take the wind direction, wind direction combined with current, and that's how you decide to where you're gonna put your boat and how your kites are gonna angle behind the boat and what depth of water they're gonna be in. So we'll fish two kites.

typically, you can do more, some people fish three. But we'll take two kites and we'll, those are each on their own kite rod, which is an electric rod, short, like a teaser rod, and that has braided kite line on there and clips that catch as the kite goes out. And typically we'll fish three rods per kite. We'll take little split shot sinkers and we'll weight the