Got out for the last two days with the Purcell group from England. We had the edge of hurricane Idalia come by us a week ago and it brought a fair amount of rain and bit of wind that’s persisted since. Water temps in the bay dropped from around 90 to 81 or so. Definitely a bit of a ‘fall’ feel to things with the slight cooloff. The last two days we had a fairly stiff northeast breeze to start that swung east later in the day. First day we caught pilchards near home and did some light tackle fishing most of the day. Snook fishing was decent and we also caught a small tarpon while doing that. Mid day we put the big tarpon gear out and hooked a couple tarpon doing that. One of them was a big 100 lber and he went right through the leader as we were rigged up for the smaller 30-40 lb fish which are typically much more prevalent now. Though we got a 2nd chance and hooked a nice 30 lber right after that. We landed him but weren’t able to get pictures unfortunaly. Day 2 we just focues on the big rods for the most part. Fished a different area and found some tarpon spread out. They weren’t showing too much but with advanced sonar we were able to line up on them and get a few bites! We caught a nice one to start and then next move we hooked another one that threw the hook unfortunately. Caught a few sharks and then after one more move we got one more tarpon which was great! We gave it a little bit more but no more tarpon love though we did get a few more sharks. We moved back to where we had fished the day before and found a group of roaming fish right in the same area we had our hookups the day before. That’s the power of fishing multiple days you just find little tid bits like that and can help you in future fishing! Anyways we set up and had to give it a little time but after about 20 minutes we hooked a double header tarpon! Very cool and we were able to land both fish and get a cool picture.
Anyways fishing can be good through September. I’ve been fishing a few trips since Capt. Stephen is out of town. I may take a few more trips if you are looking to go later this month give me a shout. Steve will be back on in October and that is one of my favorite months of the year to fish. Just lots of bait around and the more typical northeasterly breezes. Lots of tarpon heading south too as it cools off up north.
Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing
YouTube: Bud n’ Mary’s Marina
