Very cool clip of a Mako Shark following & biting the dredge-cam. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCyNMZT7ljM] This young male mako makes swimming with the fast moving dredge look effortless. …
Last Chance to Bid on a Winner in the Blazing Mako
14 Jun 20167:35 PM
By Sue Cocking, Guy Harvey Outpost Travel Journalist
scocking@guyharveyoutpost.com
Hall of Famer/fly-fishing pioneer Stu Apte is primed and ready to win the Blazing Mako Tournament and Festival this coming Father’s Day weekend at the Islander, a Guy Harvey Outpost in Islamorada. And you still have time to be part of Apte’s inshore fishing team guided by veteran flats master Captain Steve Thomas.
Bidding in the Blazing Mako auction to fish with Apte and Thomas will remain open until 10 p.m. June 17– the night before the June 18 inshore/offshore fishing contest. So far, the highest bid is $1,500. Surely you can top that for a great shot at winning the top prize of $10,000 cash.
Anglers will earn points for catching, photographing, measuring and releasing permit, bonefish, tarpon, snook and redfish using live bait, artificial lures or fly rod. Fishing conditions should be red hot only two days before the June full moon. With Apte coaching and Thomas manning the poling platform pointing out fish, how can you lose?
“I don’t know who the angler is, but I am going to help him,” Apte vowed. “If he’s a fly angler, he’ll be up on the casting platform and I’ll be on the console seat to back him up with a spinning rod. I am going to help however I can.”
Apte– who has held more than 44 saltwater light tackle and fly rod world records since the 1950s– doesn’t want to give TOO much away about his strategy for winning. But he allowed that the permit will probably be the toughest to score, while snook might be the easiest. Whatever the conditions, he has absolute confidence in Thomas’ fish-finding abilities, since the guide has been plying the Upper Keys’ back country waters practically every day from dawn till dusk for the last couple of months.
So enter your bid now at HERE, or step up at the Captains Meeting June 17 at 8 p.m. at the Islander Resort Trophy Room. And definitely plan to attend the Papa’s Pilar Fishing Seminar at the Angler House Marina beginning at 4 p.m. where you might be able to coax some tips from Apte, Thomas and other pros.
Proceeds from the Blazing Mako will benefit scholarships for students at the Halmos College of Natural Sciences and Oceanography at Nova Southeastern University.
For more information on the weekend-long event, visit www.blazingmako.com.
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Sue Cocking chronicles the Guy Harvey Outpost travel and adventure experience in regular blog posts on GuyHarveyOutpostNews.com/. For 21 years, Cocking covered the full spectrum of outdoors adventure opportunities in South Florida and beyond for the Miami Herald, including fishing, diving, hunting, paddling, camping, sailing and powerboat racing. She is a certified scuba diver and holder of an IGFA women’s world fly fishing record for a 29-pound permit.
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Share your photos, videos and experiences with Guy Harvey Outpost by hash tagging #OutpostAttitude to all of your social media posts.
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![](mailto:?subject=DEEPEND: Catching Weird Mini-Monsters from the Deep Sea&body=Inside several lockers on the fifth floor of the Guy Harvey Oceanographic Center at Nova Southeastern University near Fort Lauderdale are jars full of some of the weirdest-looking sea creatures that anyone has ever seen.
Cartoon-like miniature orange monsters with long, rapier teeth sticking out of their faces; telescope fish with goggle-like eyes that retract into their heads; dragonfish that light up like Christmas trees; anglerfish that dangle lure-like appendages with actual hooks to entice their prey.
All were collected about 3,000 feet deep in the Gulf of Mexico by scientists from the Deep Pelagic Nekton Dynamics Consortium, or DEEPEND-- a collaboration of nine universities and other research groups led by Dr. Tracey Sutton, associate professor at NSU's Halmos College of Natural Sciences and Oceanography. And the researchers are eager to share their never-before findings with the world.
"We want to make people aware of the life and diversity down deeper than anyone ever goes," Sutton said. "There's ten times more pure mass of these deep-sea fish than the shallower-water fishes."
Sutton and his colleagues began towing large pelagic trawl nets to collect specimens in the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon oil gusher which spewed 210 million gallons into the Gulf and killed 11 workers in 2010. The scientists were hired by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to find out what kinds of marine life lived down in the dark, freezing depths that may have been impacted by the spill.
The scientists netted over a million specimens of 700 different species that took them four years to identify. It's the first baseline data set of its kind in the world.
<a href="https://guyharveyoutpostblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/fish2.jpg"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-4515" src="https://guyharveyoutpostblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/fish2.jpg" alt="fish2" width="840" height="560" /></a>
"There were over 60 species that had never been found in the Gulf, including a new species of anglerfish," Sutton said. " Now we've got a big list. The deep part of the Gulf may be the best known of all the oceans of the world."
Besides looking very weird and flashing lights from various appendages on their bodies, Sutton said some of these deep-dwellers rise to the surface at night where they can be dip-netted. South Florida anglers sometimes find them in the bellies of the swordfish and marlin they catch.
You can check out photos and blogs on DEEPEND's work at <a href="http://www.deependconsortium.org">www.deependconsortium.org</a>. Scientists also give talks at boat shows, fishing clubs, and public and private schools to rave reviews. They invite teachers to join them on their research cruises.
Now operating under a grant which expires later this year, Sutton hopes to extend DEEPEND's work for two more years in order to find out how the oil spill may have affected life in the deep. Commercially and recreationally-important blue marlin and bluefin tuna are known to spawn in the waters where the disaster occurred, and one member of the consortium is studying the larvae of those two species to see if there are changes.
Sutton notes that following the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska's Prince William Sound, it took four years for that region's first ecological collapse to occur. Today, more than six years after Deepwater Horizon, about one-quarter of the oil that gushed into the Gulf has not been accounted for. And DEEPEND and others would like to determine the effects of the oil combined with Corexit, the toxic chemical used to disperse it.
"We're just now getting enough data to see how things changed naturally and because of that, to see how things may have changed because of the oil spill," Sutton said. "We have a lot better idea what lives below 1,000 meters than we did before." https://guyharveyoutpostblog.com/deepend-catching-weird-mini-monsters-from-the-deep-sea/){kind=link}
![](mailto:?subject=Tamiami Trail Triathlon: See the Everglades by Bike, Kayak, On Foot In One Day&body=<a href="https://guyharveyoutpostblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/gator.jpg"><img class="alignleft wp-image-3761 size-medium" src="https://guyharveyoutpostblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/gator-300x225.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="225" /></a>
By Sue Cocking, Guy Harvey Outpost staff writer
scocking@guyharveyoutpost.com
It's a multi-sport event like no other. You paddle instead of swim; hike instead of run; and bike the final leg with alligators as spectators. Hah! The Iron Man's got nothing on the Everglades & Big Cypress Tamiami Trail Triathlon.
Conceived by a couple of Everglades National Park rangers about three years ago as a way to encourage athletes, families, and nature lovers to "experience the diverse habitats and recreational opportunities offered along the Tamiami Trail/US 41", this free, year-round event is as strenuous or as leisurely as you want it to be. It's not a real competition. You don't have to complete all three legs in the same day. There' s no one keeping track of the time you took to finish. But by the time you are done, you will have learned a thing or two about this beautiful, fragile ecosystem-- the largest wilderness east of the Mississippi.
Recently, I completed the triathlon in just under eight hours. It was fun, not too difficult and gave me an excuse to carbo-load enthusiastically before embarking. You, too, should try it soon before the weather grows too warm and buggy.
My first stop was Everglades National Park's Gulf Coast Visitor Center in Everglades City-- starting point of the 3 1/2-mile round-trip kayak/canoe leg to Sandfly Island. (The visitor center is NOT located on Tamiami Trail, but it isn't far.) I checked in with the rangers, then set out across Chokoloskee Bay in a single sit-inside kayak. With an outgoing tide and northeast winds of 10-15 miles per hour, the trip took only about a half-hour. I wandered around the island for a few moments, examined the artesian well and cistern built by the early 20th-century inhabitants, and treaded the modern boardwalk.
When you do this leg, pay attention to the interpretive signs posted on the island because when you return to the visitor center, rangers will ask you a question about what you saw and you have to answer correctly in order to win the grand prize of a finisher bumper sticker. The same thing happens at the other two sites.
My return trip to the visitor center took more than twice the time of the outbound leg because I had to dig down against wind and tide and steer around shallow oyster bars. The cheeping of ospreys and whine of small planes taking off from Everglades Air Park made up my paddling soundscape.
<a href="http://www.guyharveyoutpost.com/fish-package"><img class="aligncenter wp-image-3768 size-full" src="https://guyharveyoutpostblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/blogad.jpg" alt="" width="490" height="293" /></a>
I got a ranger to stamp my trail map after correctly answering the non-64-million-dollar question, then hopped into my car and drove about 20 miles to the Big Cypress National Preserve Oasis Visitor Center on Tamiami Trail.
A ranger there gave me a trail map and lent me a walking stick for the three-mile loop trail hike north, and I was off.
I had previously walked this section of the Florida Trail, but never when it was this wet. Normally in mid-winter, you might encounter mud and a few shallow puddles, but nothing like the knee-deep sloughs that I slogged through. I even scattered tadpoles as I sloshed along. (If you do this, make sure you bring dry shoes and clothes.)
When I arrived at a beautiful pine and oak hammock, I was supposed to cross over to the east to reach a swamp buggy trail for the return hike to Oasis. But that trail is very rocky, so I just turned around and splashed back the way I came-- admiring distant cypress domes and exchanging greetings with an egret.
I correctly answered question number two, returned the ranger's walking stick and drove east on Tamiami Trail for 20 miles or so to the Shark Valley entrance of Everglades National Park to complete leg #3--the extremely popular 15-mile bicycle loop road.
Shark Valley is the best place by far in South Florida to encounter alligators of all sizes. They sun themselves beside the canal and sometimes even sprawl across the road, forcing you to pedal around them. (There's a reason why you find so many here, but I am not going to give away the answer to triathlon question number three.)
I set out on my bike from the visitor center and spotted a gator lolling on the side of the road in the first five minutes. It was the first of many I passed on my two-hour ride-- all of which ignored me. I also encountered anhingas drying their wings and great blue herons looking for fish to impale. Normally in mid-winter, the sawgrass prairie on the "back" side of the road is nearly dry, but water was streaming across the pavement and the culverts held whirlpools.
I made it back to the visitor center about an hour before dark and collected my congratulatory bumper sticker. This had been one very long, very exhilarating and strenuous celebration of nature-- but totally worth the effort. And a great excuse to carbo-load.
Go <a href="http://nps.gov/bicy/planyourvisit/tamiami-trail-triathlon.htm." target="_blank">HERE</a> for more information on the Tamiami Trail Triathlon.
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Sue Cocking chronicles the Guy Harvey Outpost travel and adventure experience in regular blog posts on GuyHarveyOutpostNews.com/. For 21 years, Cocking covered the full spectrum of outdoors adventure opportunities in South Florida and beyond for the Miami Herald, including fishing, diving, hunting, paddling camping, sailing and powerboat racing. She is a certified scuba diver and holder of an IGFA women's world fly fishing record for a 29-pound permit.
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Share your photos, videos and experiences with Guy Harvey Outpost by hash tagging #OutpostAttitude to all of your social media posts.
https://guyharveyoutpostblog.com/tamiami-trail-triathlon-see-the-everglades-by-bike-kayak-on-foot-in-one-day/){kind=link}
![](mailto:?subject=Help Dominica Recover from Storm Damage&body=<a href="https://guyharveyoutpostblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/11919111_10153002949500868_3782364776200787833_n.jpg"><img class="wp-image-2911 size-medium alignleft" src="https://guyharveyoutpostblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/11919111_10153002949500868_3782364776200787833_n.jpg?w=300" alt="" width="300" height="300" /></a>
The small Caribbean island of Dominica is recovering from flooding and mudslides from Tropical Storm Erika that killed at least 20 people and caused hundreds of millions of dollars in damage. Your travel there will boost that process.
The historic Fort Young Hotel, a Guy Harvey Outpost expedition property located in the island capital of Roseau, was spared serious losses from the August storm and is open, fully operational and welcoming visitors. The resort's dive boat and dock took hits, but the dock has been repaired and a substitute boat is carrying divers to Dominica's scenic array of scuba sites. Banks, restaurants, bars, and shops in Roseau are open.
Visitors can reach Dominica's Canefield Airport-- located near the hotel-- via daily Winair flights from St. Maarten. They can book a Seaborne Airlines flight from San Juan, Puerto Rico to Guadeloupe, then take the Express Des Isle ferry to Dominica. There are also frequent flights on LIAT from Antigua to Guadeloupe, Martinique and St. Lucia with ferry service to Dominica. Humming Bird Air operates out of St. Thomas/ St. Croix and Caribbean Helicopters from Antigua-- both with flights to Canefield.
Meanwhile, the Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association has launched a fund-raising drive to help Dominica's recovery. The association is asking member hotels to donate three- to seven-night vacation packages to be auctioned online. Proceeds from the auction will go into an account created by the Dominica Hotel and Tourism Association and distributed by a joint committee of the two hotel groups.
Call the Guy Harvey Outpost Reservations Office at 1-800-513-5257 for details about reserving a vacation at the Fort Young Hotel, fishing and diving packages, and so much more! Please also visit our website at <a href="http://www.guyharveyoutpost.com">www.guyharveyoutpost.com</a> for more information, photos and videos of all our exciting destinations!
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Sue Cocking chronicles the Guy Harvey Outpost travel and adventure experience in regular blog posts on GuyHarveyOutpostNews.com/. For 21 years, Cocking covered the full spectrum of outdoors adventure opportunities in South Florida and beyond for the Miami Herald, including fishing, diving, hunting, paddling, camping, sailing, and powerboat racing. She is a certified scuba diver and holder of an IGFA women's world fly fishing record for a 29-pound permit. https://guyharveyoutpostblog.com/help-dominica-recover-from-storm-damage/){kind=link}
![](mailto:?subject=Swim With the Largest Fish in the Ocean with Shark Team One&body=There's a bulldozer coming slowly toward you as you float in the warm waters off Mexico's northern Yucatan Peninsula-- and it's ALIVE.
Brown with lots of white spots, its gaping maw the size of a front-end loader, a 15-foot whale shark is cruising only six feet away. And despite your wildly-thumping heart, the shark doesn't really care that you are there; it's concentrating on sucking up zooplankton on the surface. Its small eye darts in your direction, but the shark never alters its slow, steady course.
If you join Guy Harvey Outpost's Whale Shark Expedition to Isla Mujeres, Mexico Aug 5-11, led by Angela Smith's Shark Team One, you are virtually guaranteed a repeat of this scenario multiple times per day. Your group of 10 explorers will shoot photos and video of the largest aggregation of the endangered animals known to science; learn to identify individual sharks; and contribute to a research data base compiling numbers, sex, behavior, and size information. You may also get to extend this exercise to include manta rays which are frequently seen swimming with the whale sharks.
"It's crazy good swimming among sharks that big!" Smith said. "We'll get a lot of time in the water because it's a private charter. I want [guests] to go away feeling they became shark advocates because they helped and learned things about shark conservation."
<a href="https://guyharveyoutpostblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/whaleshark3.jpg"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-4606" src="https://guyharveyoutpostblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/whaleshark3.jpg" alt="whaleshark3" width="720" height="468" /></a>
Smith, an award-winning film and video producer and marine conservationist, founded Shark Team One in 2013 to advocate for, protect, and study endangered sharks around the world. Expeditions to locations such as Mexico, Belize and the Bahamas enlist citizen scientists to observe, document and create public awareness of the sharks' plight.
In Isla Mujeres, visitors may only snorkel with whale sharks; scuba gear is not permitted because of disruptive bubbles. Flash photography also is prohibited, so Shark Team One photographers will learn how to make the best of natural light.
After each day's snorkel adventure, participants will enjoy a beach lunch and head back to town for optional shopping and cultural tours or just relaxing at Hotel Playa Media Luna, a Guy Harvey Outpost Expedition Lodge that will serve as base camp. Dinner will rotate among various local restaurants.
If this sounds fun to you (and it should!!!), book your reservations now at the <a href="http://guyharveyoutpost.com/expeditions/expedition-adventures/whale-shark-expedition/">Guy Harvey Outpost web site</a>! https://guyharveyoutpostblog.com/swim-with-the-largest-fish-in-the-ocean-with-shark-team-one/){kind=link}
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