Got out with Eric and Justine today for a full day tarpon trip. Eric really wanted a big tarpon and had caught some small ones before. I told him we found some larger size ones yesterday though it wasn’t the time of year for the big migrating fish though could possibly get lucky. Bait was a little tougher than yesterday but we managed to get what we needed plus some leftovers from yesterday. We checked the area where we fished yesterday but did not see much in the AM there. A couple fish after a long pass through, we did get one bite out of them we missed and then some big sharks. But definitely not what was there yesterday. We continued on and found some fish in the other area I’d been going too lately. Not showing much but my tarpon senses led to believe they were there. Sure enough we started getting bit up. We were having trouble keeping them on but ended up landing 5 fish – 3 to the hand, 1 to the main leader, and 1 to the wind-on leader. The rest kept flopping off every which way! They bit right through the slack tide which was nice. Also a few big sharks out there, a couple lemon sharks and blacktips. Later on we decided to check that other area for the bigger fish again on the way home. They were there now, we saw one jump and got set up and Justine jumped off a nice 60 lb fish! After that we moved in further and saw some more, but no more response out of them. Some more big black tips and did get a nice 11 lb tripletail to finish the day. The banner fishing continues this September has been one for the ages! Don’t sleep on this time of year, it’s a great time to come with very little fishing pressure and barring a hurricane, good calm conditions. 5 for 18
Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing
