One Big Fish Is All It Takes
Over 80 boats registered for the West Palm Beach Fishing Club’s 2023 Full Moon Wahoo Series. In previous years, you had to post a fish in each leg of the 3-part series to beat the competitive fleet’s aggregate weights.
It’s challenging to be consistent and catch a fish each moon, but if you’ve ever hooked a really big fish, you know it’s almost equally as challenging to successfully land a fish of this caliber.
Teams were only eligible to weigh one fish per moon, and it only took one big fish to win it all.
WPBFC member Mike Ferrara and team Terry II made the most of their bites in the series landing their only wahoo, a monster 79.8 pound fish, in the first leg of the series back in July.
Photo courtesy West Palm Beach Fishing Club
They caught this impressive fish on a live goggle eye fishing out of Jupiter Inlet with Captain George LaBonte. This was the single heaviest wahoo ever weighed in the history of the tournament. Their lone wahoo held up all summer long and Terry II walked away as the 2023 Series Champions!
Team Yellowfin and Team Whisky Business both entered the final fishing day in September with a solid 40+ pound wahoo already posted from the previous legs of the series.
Both teams made it interesting by bringing another fish to the scale at Sailfish Marina that final moon. Yellowfin’s second fish of the series weighed 23 pounds which brought their aggregate to 66.4 pounds, good enough for a 2nd place series finish overall.
If you’re already familiar with the Wahoo Series from past years, you know this crew is dialed in. Team Yellowfin has won the series twice previously, in 2018 and 2021.
Whisky Business’ second fish weighed 16.8 pounds and brought them to a 3rd place series finish with a 59.2 pound aggregate.
Photo courtesy West Palm Beach Fishing Club
Fishing for wahoo in the summertime around the full moons is a local favorite.
Whether it be trolling leads and planers, or live baiting at first light, the bite has proven to be productive.
Thank you to all the Club boats who go on the water and participated in the 7th annual Full Moon Wahoo Series!