July 2019

Well I normally don’t do any fly fishing however I had my dad and his friend Capt. Vic Gaspeny out for the day and to mix things up we brought the fly rods.  We had planned on looking for permit in the gulf, however we didn’t have great conditions with a stiff northwest breeze out there.  So we opted to look for some small tarpon in the morning.  I checked out an area I was fishing a lot last month but hadn’t been in a few weeks.  It was a bit nasty there with the wind direction, but in a more protected area we found a good amount of smaller 10 to 30 lb tarpon.  We set up and just started casting where we saw some rollers.  We jumped one on a pinfish, then they brought out the fly rods.  They each got a couple bites, and my dad hooked one that we got to the leader before jumping him off… about a 20 lb fish!  Also we got one more to eat a shrimp.  It was really good fishing to be honest!  After a bit of that though we drudged our way to the gulf but that was a mistake as it was still fairly rough.  We did see the permit a couple times, but they were not happy at all running hard and not interested in anything we tossed at them.  Oh well you can’t win them all, but it was fun to do something different.  I’ll be out of town for the weekend and it’s my birthday tomorrow, back to fishing on Monday.  Looks like we’ll be back to more typical summer time conditions by then with light southerly winds.  Hopefully the summer tarpon fishing will get into full swing!  1 for 6

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing

Fun day with Mac and his dad David! Bit of a north breeze early cooled things off a hair. But a weird condition for summer for sure. Bait was tough again, we got lucky and marked some on the electronics that we threw and caught and had enough to fish with. Tarpon went quite as thick as yesterday but we saw a few. We set up and gave it some time, catching a few sharks. Right when we were about to leave though, boom we hooked a 75 lber! He fought well and they took turns battling him. Got the fish to roll over on the leader, but as we tried to stop him for a picture he went under the boat and broke off. Sometimes they dont cooperate for this pics. Next we moved and caught a big redfish which was a nice surprise, and a few more sharks. We made a big move after that. Saw a few more tarpon and set up, no bites but we did get some more sharks and a nice snook close to 20 lbs! Wow! After that we played with some tripletail catching a good handful. Tried one other spot for something nice but no luck there. We caught a couple. More tripletails then called it a day!  1 for 1

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing

Fun day with Jeff and Katie visiting from the Pacific Northwest. Tarpon was on the agenda so we gave it a go. Bait was a little tough but made it happen. Fished a different pattern as we didn’t see a lot later on the day yesterday. But today we found a big group of fish at day break ! Within 30 seconds we were on and Jeff caught a nice 30 lb tarpon. After that I thought it was going to be easy living, but they clammed up and it got tough! A few fish hung around but the catfish and sharks got bad, and soon it seemed to dry up. We checked a couple other nearby areas but didn’t see much. We worked out way to another area and found some more tarpon. Katie jumped one, and then a few more sharks. Jeff hooked up again to a 40 lber. This fish went nuts, we got it boatside and it ended up jumping in with us. Luckily we got it out quickly without much damage. Things seemed to quiet down again and made one more move. We got a crack on a last tarpon, this one was a nice 75 lber! Katie fought it well and we got it to the boat for a few pics before heading on home. Nice day with great people! Back at it tomorrow.  3 for 4

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing