1300 lb tiger Indialantic Beach/Melbourne Fl

Talk to the Parsons up at wabasso b&t...they know very well of this catch, there is a few pics of it at Whiteys b&t in sebastian as well...should give you a good lead on the story or gettin in touch with them Will.... Great job on digging all this stuff up!...classic....mike

I am the wife of Rolando Cavazos. He did indeed catch a huge 1350 pound tiger shark in 1983. We used to have a several glossy pictures of the shark that were taken by Bill Sargent of the Today newspaper and I had scanned them onto my computer. Unfortunately the original pictures were stolen and the scans were on a computer that crashed. If anyone has a good copy of them we would really appreciate a copy.
Our whole family spent many years shark fishing when we lived in an ocean front run down cottage during the 1970's and 80's. We have caught huge Great Hammerheads, Bull sharks, Lemons, Duskys, Sand Tigers and many more varieties. We helped a budding marine biologist, Jon Dodrill, dissect and catalog over 18 varieties of sharks, all caught within 150 yards of shore in south Melbourne Beach.
At that time there was a group of sharkers called the East Coast Shark Club. They all helped Jon catalog sharks, but our family caught more than any others.
It is nice to see that thee are still a few that remember those days.

Great to have you respond to this thread Mrs Cavazos.Whitey's bait and tackle in Sebastian i was told might have a picture of the 1300 lb tiger ,,,,,call them and hopefully they will .We would love to see a picture of that shark.Do you still live in Melbourne and does Rolando still fish the beach for sharks?

Theres a picture at whiteys there today of a monster tiger looks to be about 1300+ for sure....

Theres a picture at whiteys there today of a monster tiger looks to be about 1300+ for sure....

I am sure we would all like to see the pictures, wow 1300 pounder!Mind Boggling!

I have the picture from the paper and article about Rollies Tiger. I also have a tooth from it that he gave me when I did a science fair project on sharks. When I was 9 years old or so he took me sharking fishing for the first time. As fate would have it I ended up working with him out a Patrick AFB for years. He is a great guy and a complete trip for sure, I have not seen him in some time but my friend works on his boat. I will find a scanner and post it up here.

Can someone please find us a phone number to Rollie Cavazos so we can document some of his amazing catches,tell the story and show the pics?

always wanted to fish that beach......big shark

Great find kriedel thanks you,i've been looking for the pictures of that shark for many years and now we have better ,we have the newspaper article written by Bill Sargeant one of the few sports writers in Florida to show a love for our sport reflected in the many articles he wrote in the 70s and 80s about big sharks caught from the Florida's gold coast.Notice how Rolando Cavazos mentioned he fished every day-thats hardcore dedication.Rolando Cavazo's wife wrote to me to say they had a cottage on Melbourne beach during the late 70s early 80s so iot is understandable that a person fishing that area that intensely would catch such monster sharks.During that same period of time people like Rene de Dios practically lived on the south beach pier Miami beach but never lived right on the beach.

Ps ,,,gave this historic Florida catch a much deserved sticky

Rolando Cavazos is my father. He is an amazing fisherman who has caught over 1,000 sharks including the one in that article.