July 2017

Got out with David and Brad for the last day today.  We had some leftover bait and we went to work straight away.  Last of the falling tide this morning and pretty calm with a light south breeze.  We didn’t see many tarpon where they had been the last few days..  A couple rollers, but didn’t have any bites aside from a shark and stingray.  We checked another neighboring channel, and there were a few fish in there.  We had to move around a couple times, but got in front of some and we hooked a nice 40 lber!  David landed him.  Great hookup ratio they caught every tarpon they hooked with me the last 3 days, 5 in total.  After that we caught a bunch of trout and a few pinfish to try for some snook.  Hit a few snook spots, the bugs were horrendous so we got pushed out on the shoreline.  We got 1 snook for Brad, and a few small nurse sharks, and then ended up cutting it short and coming home early at noon.  All in all another good day, and 3 great days of fishing for Brad and David.  1 for 1

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
@richardstanczyk

Got out with Brad and David again today.  We didn’t solely focus on tarpon and decided to mix things up a bit.  Early in the morning we tried to catch some pilchards, small live baits, for some snook and such.  Didn’t have much luck with that so we just went with some artificials.  We were able to catch a handful of snook and some nice trout fishing the beach shorelines.  Was hoping we’d see some tarpon off the beaches, but alas never even saw one!  We ran back and fished some of the channels where I’d been getting them the last few mornings.  Didn’t see a whole lot, but eventually a couple rolled and we got around them and Brad caught a nice 50 lb fish!  That was about all she wrote though, it was about 11:00 and we finished the day catching a few snappers for dinner.  Have these guys again tomorrow for the last day then I’m out of town through the weekend.  Tarpon will likely be on the menu at some point during the day!  1 for 1

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
@richardstanczyk

Got out with Brad and David today.  We hit the same area as yesterday, had the very start of the incoming tide.  The fish were there, not quite as happy as the last few days though.  We moved a few times and managed to catch a couple though, plus plenty of sharks.  Funny as the sharks were not there at all the last couple days.  Anyways after that we left though another boat told me they did bite a little more later on after the tide got going better.  We caught another tarpon out off the mainland areas where they had been mixed in with all the sharks.  Saw several big groups of fish, and got in front of them and hooked up pretty quick.  After that things settled down and the tide was quitting out there.  We ran out into the gulf to take a peek and found some cobia, one got eaten by a shark but we got one to the boat.  A few nice trout and a pompano as well.  Great day, back at it again with these guys the next two days.  We may try some other things but if we see some tarpon I’m sure we’ll give that a go for a little bit.  3 for 3

P.S. Again we normally don’t lift tarpon out of the water, however this one was under 40 inches so it is allowed.  Though we are careful to support the belly, and not let them flop around on the deck or wipe their slime off too much.

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
@richardstanczyk