May 2015

Had a 3/4 day trip today so we switched things up and went back in the everglades.  It’s been slick calm and the water warmed up nicely, though slick calm isn’t always the best for tarpon fishing.  The local fishery has been very tough the last week as I’m sure you can tell from my posts.  Anyways we gave the backcountry a try with the warm weather and calm it felt like summer time  so I tried some of our summer time areas.  We caught bait very well back there and tried some channels.  Saw a few tarpon roll but no bites though we did catch a big blacktip and lemon shark.  We ran out off the beaches later and caught the falling tide.  Saw quite a few tarpon out there.  We got there a little late though another boat there was having some action with them.  We caught quite a few sharks including many small blacktips, atlantic sharpnoses, a large nurse shark, and about a 250 lb tiger shark which was very cool.  Finally we were able to hook about a 100 lb tarpon that put up a very good fight to finish our day.  Tomorrow we are planning to leave early and run right to the same area so I think we will get in on the ‘hot bite’ hopefully!  1 for 1

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

Well the slow spell has continued we fished this morning and things hadn’t gotten any easier.  Bait was tough in the early morning we saw a handful of baits but weren’t able to get lined up on them right.  Luckily I was able to by some mullets and I had some dead ones from the other day plus a few crabs.  We caught the last trickle of falling tide and then had a fairly quick turnaround.  Plenty of fish again though they weren’t very happy we did not get much interest at all this morning aside from a few cudas and a shark.  Tried crabs and mullet and even a few different tricks but tarpon just wouldn’t respond.  Saw one fish caught and that was about it.  We had started out in the bay where there had been good numbers of fish and there were, then around the bridges we saw some fish laying underneath, finally we moved out on the ocean side to some fly fishing areas.  Saw probably 60 or so fish in the last 45 minutes training across the shallow areas.  But no interest for us unfortunately.  Last night was very similar we did not see as many fish as we did during the morning.  The water did warm up last night back up close to 80 degrees so I thought that would of helped.  We did find some fish eventually and had a couple fish up that boiled and flashed on our baits but wouldn’t eat.  That was about it and again we saw one boat catch a couple fish, though we saw another 50 boats throughout the night and that was the only action we saw.  Even making a drift with our crabs between 7 and 7:45 which is normally the ‘golden hour’ there wasn’t a boat to be seen hooked up to a fish.  Anyways things can’t get much tougher I’m sure they’ll have to start feeding again at some point.  I’ll likely be trying the backcountry the next few days as I have some 3/4 day trips and with as nice as the weather is some fish have likely moved in back there, plus the bycatch of sharks gives you more action!  0 for 0 and 0 for 0

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

Well I had a couple days off, Sunday was a planned day off and yesterday we had imminent threats of rain and lightning in the morning so I called it off.  I had caught a cold too and wasn’t looking forward to being drizzled on after fishing monday.  Anyways I am better now.  Unfortunately the tarpon fishing has definitely slowed down we had a little bit of a late front hit us and the water has chilled down to 74 degrees or so.  Monday we had ran in the backcountry to fish and normally I wouldn’t of gone back there but my customers wanted to.  We only had 2 shark bites fishing the big rods and then we did catch a load of trout, ladyfish, snapper, and jacks to bend the rod.  No tarpon bites back there but didn’t expect it to be much good.  This morning around town here I was surprised how cold the water had got, usually with an incoming tide and being closer to the Atlantic it would of stayed a little warmer.  But anyways we had a north breeze and plenty of fish around but they were not really happy.  We had fished 5 different spots and saw fish in each spot but only had one bite.  A small fish on dead bait and he threw the hook soon after we hooked him.  I didn’t see anyone out there catch a fish and there was a lot of boats as there is a tournament going on.  Things should improve the wind has slicked out now and I imagine it will warm up considerably given a day and that should make the fish much more happy.  I’ve got a night trip tonight hopefully that will be better.  0 for 0 and 0 for 1

Capt. Rick Stanczyk