Got out today with my good customers the Thompsons. We fished the backcountry as last time we were out we had found a decent number of fish back there and it’s that time of year that sometimes its nice to transition to backcountry fishing as opposed to the bridges. It’s remained fairly calm though we had a little tad bit of a southerly breeze which isn’t our favorite but luckily it wasn’t blowing hard. Tarpon were actually fairly plentiful early on we saw some rolling and a handful free jumping and busting. We got into them pretty good and I was seeing quite a few on the sonar as well as with my eyes. I thought we’d get bit up but the tarpon weren’t too responsive really. We jumped around and fished hard for 2 hours catching plenty of sharks including a few hammerheads which was cool. We had several times where I marked fish literally swimming right near our baits, and even rolled on the surface right over top. If you were a betting man that was the time you’d bet on getting a bite for sure! But they just weren’t having it. Finally after moving 6 or 7 times and putting in a good solid couple of hours we hooked a fish. We fought him for a minute or two but unfortunately he jumped off, though the next bait out we hooked another one and landed him… alright on the board! Tarpon fishing can be like that you can have fish all over and when they don’t want to play you just have to keep grinding. After that we switched gears and gave the big snook a try and ended up actually catching a couple more tarpon while we were doing that which was unexpected. But nice smaller size fish on the lighter tackle was great fun and we also got a couple of big snook too. So all in all a great day and quality over quantity but totally worth it for my guys!
Capt. Stephen has been fishing with me several times out back recently and I’ve been dialing him in on my tarpon routine for the summer time. I’m pretty much all booked up myself for June but he has dates available for sure. If you want to get out chasing tarpon the next few months give me a shout and if I can’t take you I can put you with him and as mentioned he’s been seeing exactly how I fish and really learning my methods so you’ll be in great hands.
Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing
YouTube: Bud n’ Mary’s Marina
