Mako My Day

Afunny thing happened on the way to fish for grouper for the 2007 Destin Fishing Rodeo. Capt. Robert Hill hauled in the largest fish ever caught in the 59-year history of the Rodeo — an 844.4-pound short fin mako shark.

His boat, Twilight, hauled the monster back to the dock some 70 miles and still enjoys the Destin history-making buzz a year later. Hill’s friend Adlee Bruner, who caught the shark, has the head and jaws mounted in his hunting lodge in Bruce — so he sees it quite often.

This year, the Rodeo’s Record Shark Award is a $2,000 Savings Bond and Glass Rodeo Award. For the first time the prize is sponsored by Hill’s charter boat, Twilight.

“Yeah, it’s an I dare you,” He smiles and says. “The weight to beat is 638.2 pounds; it’s all about a little friendly competition. The sponsorship of the award was up for grabs,” Hill explains. “If it had not been us, it would have been another charter boat because we just weren’t going to let it go by the wayside.”

Hill says it is quiet now as the 60th annual Destin Fishing Rodeo approaches. But after the record breaking catch, phone calls and e-mails came in from around the world. He was offered $15,000 for the jaws alone.

“We had mako munchies all year,” the captain said. “On the Fourth of July we grilled it!” Adlee chartered the boat for him and his lumber mill co-workers that fateful Saturday on Oct. 13. They left the docks and headed out for a spot that Hill had been “saving” all year long.

Hill says Adlee has fished the waters of Destin for some 30 years. He replays the day saying that they were out in the deep waters, and that they had already caught some good fish, but their lines were breaking from what they thought to be a very large grouper.

The shark surfaced just behind the boat as it stalked a fish the crew was reeling in. Within two minutes, he recalls, they had a live amberine out of the well, onto the hook and into the water.

The shark went back deep into the water and Hill yelled for the anglers to cast out the other lines as that was what brought the shark up to the boat — and within minutes he took the bait. After a fight that ended in less than an hour the shark was subdued at the side of the boat.

“We caught a lot of flack after the shark was caught last year,” he says adjusting his flip flop. “I accidentally started some of it!”

He explains that once the shark was tied to the Twilight and being hauled back in for a weigh-in that he kept watching the ropes and thinking that this shark is either really fat or really pregnant so he radioed that into the dock. But as it turns out, the shark wasn’t expecting, it just had a belly full of 200 pounds of fat fish.

But the controversy still simmered and animal rights groups like the U.S. Humane Society lobbied Regions Bank, which sponsored the prize, to pull the plug in 2008. The bank is no longer sponsoring the shark prize, but it is still ponying up the jackpot for rodeo record breakers in other categories.

“The bank wussed out with all the backlash, but we weren’t gonna let it die,” said Hill. Hill notes that this year he has caught 15 or more mako sharks in Destin waters, all of which were much smaller than the record breaker and all were released into the waters.

“Charter fishermen are the first to get regulated and the first to abide by the rules,” he points out. “The Gulf of Mexico is in the best shape for fishing that it has been in years so our job respecting the fishery is easy.”

Capt. Hill loves his work and is proud to be a part of a group of boat owners who own the area behind Fisherman’s Wharf Restaurant and have made a pact that the land will, in his words, “always be a fishing marina forever and forever and forever”.

The Hill family has a long history with the Destin Fishing Rodeo as Amber, Robert’s wife, was Miss Destin in 1996. They now enjoy the Rodeo with their children Easton who is 4 and Lauralee, 2. Hill’s deckhand and friend, Eric Hayles’ wife, Angela, was also a Miss Destin. The Hayles are expecting their second child. Hill pointed out that Adlee split last year’s winning savings bond between Hill’s son, Easton, and Eric’s son, Maddox.

Twilight is also sponsoring the Swordfish Division for the 60th annual Destin Fishing Rodeo. “This is the newest, hottest fishery,” Robert says. “It has been commercial outlawed for several years and the stock in the Gulf has exploded!

We’ve been seven for eight in swordfish trips and the night fishing experience is one you will never forget! All sorts of things are attracted to the surface in the moonlight. We still have eight open days for the Rodeo and last year we were already booked by this time. I’m sure it is the rising cost of fuel,” he adds.

To book time still available on one of four boats for the Destin Fishing Rodeo, call (850) 837-2320.

Published on Wednesday, September 10, 2008