# Da Big Black Groopaa!!!! with video and pics



## Gone Fishin' Too

Well C-Monsters and I decided to head out about 7:30am on Sunday in search for anything that would taste good for dinner. It had been several months since we have been offshore and we both needed some saltwater therapy. It was quite a sporty trip with it still being a small craft advisory in the am, and we saw no other boats going out at all. We headed south for about 25-30 miles and stopped to drift some natural bottom. We had frozen bait (squid and cigar minnows) and we started getting bites on both. I started out with a jig and immediately hooked up with a 30" + AJ. Then we caught some nice scamps and mingos and a big trigger fish. We also caught plenty of typical bait fishes and the several large endangered Red Snapper. C-Monters had other commitments later in the day so at 1pm he gave the 20 min deadline cutoff. So I immediately switched back to a jig to try to limit out on AJ's and C-Monsters tried soaking another live bait. Several live baits have feed the predators down below with no positive hooksets. With about 10 minutes to go C-Monsters hooks up with a large fish that appeared to be the limit of Amberjack that we were looking for, so I reeled up and grabbed the camera and started some video footage of his catch. He fought this fish for several minutes and as it came to the surface we quickly realized that we hit the jackpot with a nice grouper. C-Monster and I have had this impeccable curse for not being able to catch any type of groupers except Scamp. We knew it wasn't a Gag grouper (thank God, because we were in Federal Water where Gag's are still out of season), so we got out the book to make sure it wasn't a Goliath grouper and finally came to the conclusion that it was a Black Grouper. We weighed it on the scale and it rang in at 50 lbs even. After settling down, we looked up to see Team Recess about 300 yards away and we thought we might just have them give us the peace of mind that we caught our largest legal Grouper. Once in range of Team Recess we lifted the grouper and they congratulated us for a nice Black Grouper. So we were relieved that our conclusion was correct. The seas were settling down about 1pm and we had an awesome ride back recanting the epic battle with this elusive Black Grouper.

http://youtu.be/u3MeNUX4VrU?hd=1


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## jimmyjams4110

CARBURETOR!!!!! Nice catch! Very much a novelty around here. Enjoy the good eats!


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## jjam

Congratulations my friend, :notworthy: Never landed a black groupa yet on de' LBT...
I believe the Recess Team may have taken a bow and handed over the Grouper Master Hat over to the Gone Fishn' Too crew for the day...:thumbup:

You know you're in good company when that Purple boat is in site.

Jimmy


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## Pinksnappertrapper

DAMN!! Congrats.


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## marmidor

Damn fine catch Capt!!!


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## Realtor

very nice, good on you guys!!!!


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## sniper

DAAYYYUUMMM 
Look at the size of that steak!!!
Great job.


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## Frenchy

Nice one :thumbsup:


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## sail7seas

congrats on an awesome catch. that fish has some great colors


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## Chris V

Graet catch! Its cool just to catch a true black grouper here and to get one that size makes it even better.


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## Garbo

Dang....


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## Snatch it

Wow!!!!


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## ADRENALINE

Nice fish!!!! I have only caught two over the years and nowhere near that size.


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## Mullethead

Sweet.... and I hope everybody takes note... thats what a true black looks like


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## ateupwitit

excellent catch, beautiful fish.........live bait with a jigging rod sweet


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## Bub

awesome fish. Definitely a quality Black regardless of where she was caught, but for the panhandle thats insane! Nice job


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## parrothead

All i have to say is ,,,,,,YOU SUCK !!!!!!!!!!!! J/K :thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup: Glad you guys made it out there. Very nice black !!!!!!!!!! Give me a call Chris and we'll get out there.

Scott


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## Gone Fishin' Too

I just realized that I like them BIG and BLACK!!!!:brows:




Grouper that is...........and yes, it is very tastey!!!:yes:


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## C-monsters

What an awesome trip. It was great to watch the video again, and the pic with my kids(the real C-monsters) is great. Can't wait to do it again.


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## Ocean Master

Great suprise fish. Which Shimano rod where you using. It looks like it had plenty of backbone. Model#??? I ask b/c I need a new one.
Thanks


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## Scout800

ateupwitit said:


> excellent catch, beautiful fish.........live bait with a jigging rod sweet




I was thinking the same thing, kinda answers the other thread that was on here the other day.


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## C-monsters

Ocean Master said:


> Great suprise fish. Which Shimano rod where you using. It looks like it had plenty of backbone. Model#??? I ask b/c I need a new one.
> Thanks


It is a Shimano Trevala heavy action rod, 80-200lb test braid. It was rigged with 100lb braid, and had a 100lb fluorocarbon leader. I almost tied an 80 lb leader on, but was very glad I didn't. The leader was pretty frayed after the fight.


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## mcbig1

damn man do they make a bun big enuf for a fillet that size?good read and good fish!!!
mike


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## MSViking

Awesome fish and pics! Way to get it done!!


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## [email protected]

chris way to get the year started out!! awesome brother and congrats


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