Well got back on the hot fishing again today thankfully. The winds laid out nicely yesterday. Yesterday I just had a half day of trout fishing which was good. Today I had John and his son Jake down from Idaho. They have a gold mine there. Today we didn’t find any gold, but we did find a bunch of silver! I caught some bait early on as it was flat calm so figured it might be tough doing that once the sun was up. We headed into the backcountry and caught the very start of the falling tide. Fish were everywhere free jumping, it was nice to see after being back there a few days ago with the wind howling and not seeing much at all. We got right to it and proceed to catch six tarpon in a row! They all stayed on the hook until we got the leader, and got several boat side pics with a few of them. By noon we were pretty much done, we had a couple more bites we missed (averages had to catch up with us at some point!). We finished the day catching a few trout and ladyfish, and reloaded on mullet on the way home for the next few days. The wind did pick up a little when we were finishing up with the tarpon, but not too bad. Tomorrow it looks to be blowing a little more but shouldn’t be too crazy, and then nice the rest of the week until Friday. Another cold front suppose to his us that night, so that may mess the fishing up again for a few days but hopefully it’ll fizzle out! 6 for 8
Capt. Rick Stanczyk
3/31/17 March Tarpon Fishing Islamorada
Well I must’ve jinxed myself a few days ago when I said fishing was just starting to get good… The last couple days out have been tough! Today we ran into the backcountry and the winds were cranking out of the south about 20 mph… My clients were not die hard for tarpon so I figured going out back would give us some other options as well. We found a few tarpon in the first channel we fished, but they didn’t want to bite. We tried for a while and moved a few times, never even had a shark bite! We did end up catching a small cobia though at least. We ran further back where there had been tons of tarpon last week, but didn’t see much at all out there. We did end up catching a couple blacktip sharks though. We then bent the light rods for a while, caught plenty of trout and ladyfish, and a few for dinner. We tried for tarpon again near home for the last hour, again saw a few fish but no bite. I heard a few guys that stuck it out all day fishing around town did have a handful of bites, but the general consensus was you were lucky to get a couple shots for four, five, or six hours of fishing! Anyways the winds are suppose to die down tonight, hopefully the water will clean back up and the fish will get happier. I don’t know if I’m tarpon fishing tomorrow, but we’ll see! 0 for 0
3/28/17 Half Day Tarpon Fishing in Islamorada
Got out for a half day today to do some tarpon fishing. Had some bait leftover from yesterday and some live mullet that I kept overnight that were in good shape. Unfortunately the tarpon were not very cooperative. We found some fish in the channel where I had caught them a few days ago, but they didn’t bite early on. We went down to the bigger bridges and channels down the road, and found a lot of fish out off the edge of one of the flats leading to the bridge. My buddy who was also fishing the other part of our party ended up having a bite and catching one there, but we moved around 4 or 5 times, and never had one even show any interest in a bait. A couple baits did get pretty nervous, and we caught a big jack crevelle, but that was it. Tried the channels near home again for the last hour of the trip, and no bites there either. Anyways, tough morning for us… It was nice to get on a little roll while it lasted. Tomorrow I have the same crew but we are meat fishing, and Thursday I’m off, so may not get back to tarpon fishing until Friday or so. 0 for 0
