Got out with John, Jude, and Jim today three youngsters from Texas. It was a group trip and their uncle and his boys were on the other boat. It was a marina booking so I hadn’t talked to the crew beforehand but they were not up for going early as is my usual routine this time of year. They wanted to have action with whatever and hoped to maybe catch a tarpon. So I said no problem for the more serious anglers the early start is always what I recommend now but luckily I had some leftover bait so I said we’d have a shot anyways. We bent the little rod to start and that was good action with trout, snapper, and ladyfish. Then we tried a channel for tarpon. Didn’t see much to start but did catch a couple sharks. Then some fish popped up and we moved in on them. We put a little time in and then jumped one tarpon, then we hooked and landed a nice 25 lber! After that they seemed to disappear. I was happy though we put it together even with the late start. We tried a spot for some cobias after that in the gulf with no luck. Then we were going to catch some bigger sharks and caught a tripletail. In the shark area though we found a ton of tarpon! I had not seen tarpon here in this spot like this in a couple years so it was great to see. Larger size fish and lots of them. We slide in and soon after we jumped another tarpon, then we caught a nice 80 lber! After that the fish seemed to move around a little, but they settled back in and about 45 minutes later we caught another on the change of the tide! So all three boys landed a tarpon – just great! We caught a few more blacktip sharks and then called it a day. We definitely lucked out and thankfully I had enough leftover bait to make it happen. But the big deal about leaving early a lot of times is catching bait – there isn’t anyone to buy it from and sometimes if you aren’t out there at daybreak, you ain’t gonna catch it! I’m off tomorrow for my birthday and then back at it on the 5th. Hopefully some of these fish stick around! 3 for 5
Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing
