Got out with Sean and his son Kyle today for a full day in the backcountry everglades in Islamorada for some tarpon fishing. The winds were kicking southwest about 20 mph, and it was forecast to be nasty with rain but didn’t really show up until the end of the day thankfully so we made it out. Bait was easy we caught a bunch and headed to the tarpon channels. Plenty of fish in there this morning, saw several busts and a few rollers, and was marking a lot on my sonar. I figured we’d get bit up quick since it was pretty good yesterday. Though today they were not quite as happy, we waited it out and after 45 minutes or so, Kyle hooked a nice 70 lb fish. He did a great job and the fish fought hard but we got him up for pictures. After that things slowed down we had a few small sharks that was it. We tried further up the channel and got a big sting ray. After that we made a move and hit another channel where I had gotten them the other day later in the day. We got a bite right away and kyle landed another fish, smaller guy about a 35 lber – fun size! After that it was dads turn he hooked a nice larger fish again about a 70 lber. We fought him for about 5 minutes and got him to the leader and he made a glorious jump off the bow but threw the hook. We got some great pictures though and they don’t all cooperate for pictures, but we had the leader to the tip for a technical release. After that Sean hooked up a big hammerhead we landed, and then got a smaller hammer, which was very cool. The rain started to show up off the mainland and we stopped to bend the light rods with some ladyfish and then headed home. Quite a lightning show offshore of Islamorada when we got back there, luckily we made it home without any trouble. Taking tomorrow off to pull my boat for some boat work, and then I’m open later this week. As you can tell fishing is really good right now I hope it will keep up, August is still a great time too. I have plenty of availability so if you are thinking about it, look me up! 3 for 3
Capt. Rick Stanczyk
@richardstanczyk
