Got out again after some tarpon with Adam and his friend Matt visiting from UK. Tarpon was on the list and we headed out into the everglades where we’d found a huge group of fish the last few days. Conditions were still favorable slightly more wind but not bad at all. We had good incoming tide until 10/1030 AM or so but got an early start to try and take advantage, as the falling tide afterwards has been very weak on the recent cycle and not much going on then. Anyways the bite was a bit slower than the last few days we jumped around a good 4 or 5 times and had nothing but shark activity. We were seeing a few tarpon all spread out but you could really feel the difference they just weren’t congregating and schooled up thick like they were the previous days. Who knows if thats weather or something else they weren’t liking. But finally we did get a bite and hooked a big dog that Matt fought well. He almost dumped the spool on us and acted very much like a big shark as he didn’t jump for the first 5-10 minutes. But luckily we chased after him and get him the benefit of the doubt! We got that fish on the leader but once we tried to put the wood to him for rolling him over, the hook pulled. But a leader release none the less. After that we wound up in a good school of fish where we ended up so we stopped and put them out right there. Pretty soon we hooked another one on a live grunt which was cool! Adam said he had a feeling that was gonna be the rod and he was right! This fish we got up boatside and the boys got pictures I didn’t get any myself but we were trying to be quick as I’ve mentioned the sharks have been so bad you don’t want to mess around with pictures too long or too much. That was about it for our tarpon action we fought a big shark for about 40 minutes after that and had a few more blacktips before the tide quite. We tried for a big snook at the end of the day and did catch a few big jacks and other sharks on light tackle. But anyways glad to have gotten a couple fish we definitely were keeping our eyes on the fleet and not nearly as many hooked or caught today overall but that’s fishing. Hopefully tomorrow is a little better but the good news is they are there and we don’t have any cold in the forecast so you should still have a good shot regardless if you are fishing near now! Give me a shout if you want to get out for tarpon this spring.
Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing
YouTube: Bud n’ Mary’s Marina
