on the range with

adjusting techniques and depths may be necessary as the day progresses. Paying attention to subtle changes in water temperature and fish behavior will be key to adapting and staying successful throughout the day.

Overall, Lake Okeechobee continues to live up to its reputation as a topnotch bass fishing destination. Whether you’re a seasoned angler or a novice looking to test your skills, now is the time to hit the water and experience the thrill of reeling in some truly impressive bass.

It’s been a long time since there was a sale sign at your local gun shop.

If you have been thinking about buying a new firearm, this is the time to do it. The industry has transformed from a seller’s market into a buyer’s market. What does that mean?

As with just about every industry, there are high times and low times. The gun market is no different. When the times are good, they are good, but when the times go bad, they are bad.

There are a lot of factors that determine this industry. Politics plays a huge factor. In some states where state governments want to enact more laws, that market will be on fire until those new proposals become new laws. Then the door closes, and it goes quiet.

Crime is also a factor. In areas where crime is more prevalent, then people have that want or need to protect themselves, where as a state that takes a proactive approach to crime, people may not be in such a hurry to buy a firearm.

Normally a pandemic would not be a factor, but Covid brought about one of if not the biggest rushes to buy weapons and ammunition this country has ever seen.

When times are slow in the industry, the industry becomes its worst enemy. Online retailers and even large stores will virtually sell their firearms at their wholesale cost just to turn the inventory over and recover the lost funding they used to buy the excessive amount of inventory they ordered thinking that the run would last. Unfortunately, it all comes to a screaming halt at some point, it always does.

As dealers we just have to hang in and wait it out. Something will come down the line at some point to boost things back up, but for now it may be a long summer and fall.

So now is the time to go and buy. There are deals to be had. Don’t pass this time up, because when the deals are gone, they are gone.

Sportfishing is a lot of fun in the summer. Trolling the reefs is pretty much non-stop action on bonitos and kingfish, they are really thick out there. On some days, you can literally catch over forty 20-pound bonitos in a half day trip; they are just everywhere. Mixed right in with the schools of bonitos are kingfish, wahoo, and even sailfish. They all feed on the same baitfish, so it makes sense they would be patrolling the same territory. Blackfin tuna are also a great summertime fish we catch a lot of this month. Blackfins tend to travel solo this time of year and they are much larger than the football sized ones we’ve been catching the past couple months. The July blackfins we catch are full grown and well-fed 35 pounders. I catch a lot of blackfins trolling near the Pompano and Hollywood sewer outfalls. Fishing around the shipwrecks can be good for some big fish too. Barracuda, jacks, and sharks like to hang around the shallow wrecks during this time of year, while grouper and cobia fishing is good on the wrecks over 200’ deep.

Offshore fishing is picking up too. The mahi-mahi have finally shown up for us and are forming up into some pretty large schools. This is a good season to head offshore and troll along the weedlines, looking for birds and floating debris. If you’ve got a long trip, you can go out there and keep trolling around until you find a school of fish. Then, just keep at least one in the water and pull out the light tackle bailing rods; you can sit on top of a school of dolphin and bail them all day, it’s a blast! The dolphin are small ones, most of them schoolie-sized at 3-5 pounds. Recently, we were live baiting with the kites in only 150’ of water and caught a 64-pound mahi-mahi, our biggest one all year. Usually for those monster dolphin, you have to go way offshore to find them, but this one came right into the reef. There’s a lot of activity a mile and half off our coast which attracts some of the biggest gamefish around. It’s shaping up to be an excellent July fishing season. Tight lines!