Got out with the Donahue brothers today over from California. We caught plenty of trout in the morning and saved some for dinner. Later on we ran back to look for the tarpon off of Flamingo. We saw a handful though we had to wait a bit for the tide to start coming in. After 45 minutes and a couple moves, it started to creep in slowly. We hadn’t had much action, and made another move out to where we saw some fish showing. After a bit we finally hooked a nice 110 lb fish. He fought hard and we landed him though no boatside picture as he broke off on the leader. Set back up and about 30 minutes later we hooked another fish, of about 90 lbs or so. Same type of fight he stayed down and dirty and made a few crazy leaping jumps. We got him on the leader and tried to take it a little easier on him, but after several violent thrusts under the boat, the hook pulled out. They just didn’t want to cooperate for photo ops, but good release none the less. The last fish we hooked about 15 minutes later, we got him boat side after 10 minutes or so, but he jumped and threw the hook but got the leader into the rod tip for a technical release. So all in all fairly good fishing though we had to wait on it to get right, the first hour and a half almost had me sweating! Anyways couple half days the next two days, probably fishing tarpon locally around the bridges and channels. We’ll see what happens! 3 for 3
Capt. Rick Stanczyk
3/26/17 March Tarpon Fishing half day Islamorada
Got out with Zack and his dad Peter this morning for a half day tarpon trip. We didn’t see much in the first channel and it was very weedy… made it tough to fish our live baits they kept getting knocked off the hooks. I moved after 20 minutes since we hadn’t seen much and got frustrated after losing 3 baits. But we moved out to the other end of the channel and found a big pack of tarpon! They were rolling frequently and busting here and there. We ended up hooking one after about 15 minutes of fishing, Zack caught a nice 80 lb fish. After that it kind of slowed down, we caught a shark and a big jack crevelle. Though no more tarpon bites. We moved around a little bit too but no luck. After that they started to thin out and I moved to the channel next door. We found some more fish there and gave it some time, catching a few more blacktips, a big nurse shark, and then another tarpon of about 60 lbs! Continued to see a few more fish, and caught another big jack, and then that was about the end of our morning. The tide was quitting and it was time to go. Though very happy to have caught a couple, the winds are suppose to subside today and should be a nice week coming up. I think the fishing will be good! 2 for 2
3/25/17 March Tarpon Fishing Islamorada in the Everglades
Got out today for a 3/4 day with Dennis and his daughter Molly down from Minnesota. They didn’t have any specific requests for fishing, so I suggested we do a mix of light tackle and then try for some bigger stuff possibly tarpon and sharks. Things worked out great we had good action with trout in the morning and did that for a little over an hour or so. Then we checked a couple tarpon spots. Nothing in the first set of channels, I had thought maybe some fish would of pushed in there with the weather warming up but didn’t see much though I didn’t try fishing it either. I ran back to where the big school of tarpon was a few days ago, and there were still a few there! They weren’t stacked up like the other day, but after a little looking around I started to see some signs of them. We set up and within 15 minutes or so had a nice 75 lb fish on that Dennis caught. We caught a few sharks too which Molly loved, and then she got to catch a tarpon roughly the same size as dads. It jumped like crazy and hit the boat, we got the leader on it, but then the hook pulled before we could get a good picture though a legal catch. After that we headed home and stopped to catch bait for tomorrow on the way. Not sure what I’m doing tomorrow but I think I have a half day so may be fishing closer to town if it’s for tarpon. 2 for 2
