RJ Boyle

RJ Boyle has spent decades fishing the waters off South Florida, where he became one of the pioneers of daytime swordfishing and built a reputation as a heavy tackle specialist and meticulous bait and lure rigger. He grew up around the Hillsboro Inlet, worked as a full time mate for fifteen years, and now owns RJ Boyle Studio, a tackle shop and charter operation in Lighthouse Point, Florida. His courses cover daytime swordfishing, high speed wahoo trolling, blue marlin lure rigging, dredge fishing, and planer techniques, giving anglers access to a rare breadth of offshore knowledge built from thousands of hours on the water.

Instructor's videos

RJ Boyle grew up around the Hillsboro Inlet in South Florida, tagging along on the drift boat Helen S, where his older brother worked as a mate. That early exposure to a working boat set the direction for the next several decades. RJ spent fifteen years as a mate himself, transitioning from part time work into a full time career on some of the top boats fishing South Florida, including a long run aboard The Concrete Machine. Fishing that boat five days a week, he built the foundation of his high speed wahoo trolling knowledge through constant repetition, fine tuning leads, speeds, and wire rigs while also logging serious time on blue marlin.

That grinding, repetitive apprenticeship is where RJ's technical depth comes from, and it shows in the range of what he teaches. He is widely recognized as one of the pioneers of daytime swordfishing, helping develop the depth strategies, current reading, and rigging systems that turned broadbill from a nighttime surface fishery into a technical daytime pursuit. His swordfish instruction covers the full spectrum of the technique, from reading current stratification at 1,000 to 2,000 feet, to rigging seven distinct bait options for changing conditions, to the boat handling and drag management required to land fish in the 500 to 900 pound class, to the hand crank approach favored by anglers chasing IGFA compliant records.

Swordfish is only part of the picture. RJ's high speed wahoo trolling instruction breaks down leader construction, wire specifications, and the immediate post strike response that prevents short strikes at speeds up to 18 knots, along with the rod and reel selection that determines whether an angler feels the bite in time to react. His blue marlin lure rigging instruction reflects his transition from commercial mate to serious tournament competitor, where hook set construction, skirt seating, and positioning precision are the difference between a placement and a preventable equipment failure. He also teaches dredge fishing for billfish alongside Captain Glenn Cameron, and has built out a full library on planer fishing, covering both small center console setups and big boat driving technique for working fish suspended off the bottom.

What sets RJ apart is not a single specialty but the breadth of what he has fished and rigged at a high level. He moves comfortably between heavy tackle billfish work, high speed trolling, technical deep dropping, and the fine detail of bait and lure rigging that most anglers never see demonstrated properly. That range comes from a career built on the water rather than in front of a camera, first as a mate learning from the captains around him, then as a captain and tackle shop owner passing that knowledge on to the next generation of anglers.

RJ has carried that same hands on approach into RJ Boyle Studio in Lighthouse Point, Florida, where he has spent more than two decades building what has become a hub for swordfish tackle, running fishing charters out of Lighthouse Point Marina, and mentoring anglers who want to fish the way he learned to, through direct instruction from someone who has actually done it. His In The Spread courses bring that same depth of knowledge to anglers anywhere in the world who want to fish smarter offshore.