What’s the shot at catching tarpon in January is a question I’m often asked. I always tell people it’s possible depending on conditions but likely not to be expected when you are booking a few weeks or more out. However if we have a streak of warm, calm weather it can happen any time. Last week we had a pretty hard cold front and water temps dropped down into the mid 50s, about as cold as it normally gets here. Though it got nicer over the weekend and today it was completely slick calm and near 80 degrees. Even though the water temps were still in the low to mid 60s (typically I would say too cold for tarpon), once the tide started coming in tarpon popped up all over the place. That warm radiating sun can do some funny things to the fish. They were even biting too we didn’t spend too much time messing with them but we caught a big 90 lber and then a smaller 15 lber later on. Now had you been here a week ago the chances I would’ve said were pretty slim. Though knowing it was slick calm this week I would say there’s much more of a chance. Unfortunately you never really can tell but you get a much better idea when the time gets closer and you have an accurate idea of what the weather is going to do. So you can keep that in the back of your mind and ultimately it’s best to just fish the conditions. Anyways I think we’ll have another day or so of this and then we get some more north wind and more cool weather after that so they’ll likely disappear again for a bit. But its only another month or so when we really start catching tarpon fairly regularly often in February, as long as there aren’t any cold fronts and that is more likely as you get further into the spring. We’ve got some open days now and its not too busy yet until we get close to mid february timeframe. If you want to get out give us a shout – we can give the tarpon a try if its feasible and if not theres usually other good options like snook, redfish, drum, and more!
Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing
YouTube: Bud n’ Mary’s Marina
