gbcreed Loc: Land O Lakes, FL

Went out of Anclote and tried Veteran’s Reef. Not much luck so went to Tarpon Springs Reef. It was better. I caught a Hog Fish and a Mackerel along with the usual Grunts, Jacks and Perch. Then my buddy hooked and landed the 80”, 200lb (estimated) Bull Shark. It took him 30 min and it took hour of us to lift it out of the water. We took lots of pictures, measured it and released it because we really didn’t know what kind it was or if we were allowed to keep it.
I had The Fish Rules app on my phone but it was so bright outside and we were soo excited, we weren’t sure. When we aren’t sure, we release.

graybeard49 Loc: Bradenton, fl

Sharks should always be released. Only one I heard of
being good to eat was a Mako. Nice catch and good release👍

Wv mike Loc: Parkersburg area. Wv

Wow now that’s a big en

Flytier Loc: Wilmington Delaware

It's always better to be safe when it comes to fishing regs.

NJ219bands Loc: New Jersey

Nice 👍

E.pa.al Loc: Martin's Creek

That's awesome, great catch

Gordon Loc: Charleston South Carolina

Nice one GB. That is a Hog

Corkynewman Loc: Holiday Florida

I fish out of anclote all the time and seen a few bulls..they leave me alone and i leave them alone..

saw1 Loc: nor cal Windsor

Man, that's a nice one. Congrats to all involved. Glad y'all released it too.

tomogren Loc: San Luis Obispo, CA

If you wade fish in Florida, you need to watch out for bull sharks. They can, and do, take off people's legs, arms. Alligators are bad enough, but bull sharks? Worst fish in the ocean. They come up into fresh water, too.

Fishdadd Loc: NE Ohio

Nice shark. Good thinking about the release if you’re not sure. We had a group of fifty people in houses together (my wife’s family is huge) and two of us went shark fishing on a near shore charter following the shrimpers. Caught four black tips. Captain filleted them out and they all went in the grill and I still think of those big white beautiful chunks of shark meat once in a while.

JGator Loc: Laguna beach, Fl

Nice Shark, that is bigger than i want to tangle with when fishing alone. That's part of the reason I don't target sharks when surf fishing. As fyi, Bull is not the vest of sharks or fish for that matter to eat (it eats everything so that is what it tastes like). Mako is close to the best (up there with White and Tiger - I know we can't keep those in FL and I wouldn't, but the meat is commercially available in some gourmet markets like good Harry's Farmers Market). THe texture is muck like Swordfish/Wahoo/Blue Marlin (another Harry's Farmers Market purchase) and the flavor is mostly mild and takes on flavor of what you add to it. Blacktip is also very good if handled correctly at catch to preserve meat; kill it fast to reduce stress and ammonia production, then rough gut and bleed it before getting it iced down heavily. If a super hot day and far from the docks I would skip the gutting and just bleed it and ice it which can be done at the same time. Try it next time! FYI the regs on blacktip- No min or max size limit but must keep intact- you can cut from its caudal vent to its mouth to gut it, but don't remove any of the fish itself Head/Fins/etc.

gbcreed Loc: Land O Lakes, FL

Thank you. Great information.
We weren’t targeting shark. We were really out for Grunts, Mackerel and Trout.
The big boy showed up and one of the guys had a shark rig.
We must have been quite a sight. 4 seventy plus old men trying to lift that shark on the boat. We almost gave up several times.
We’ve caught smaller sharks, Black Tips, Black Nose and Bonnet Head. They were two to three feet and very tasty.