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Awesome day with the McElroy crew! We spent the day tarpon fishing. Caught some bait early and hit the bridges. Little choppy with the south wind and a hard tide, and very grassy as has been the case often lately. With such a warm early summer, the sargasm showed up ahead of schedule. Anyways we got anchored and just had steady tarpon action until 11 am or so. They were eating everything, great live bait bites and putting on a great show. It was combat fishing trying to maneuver around the bridges but we got 3 tarpon to the hand, leader release on a 4th, and lost a 5th in the bridge. But we probably had ten other bites – a lot of grabs on the live baits and they’d pull for a couple seconds and spit it. But exciting none the less! After we were out of fresh bait we caught some more, had to work at it but got a decent amount. Tried fishing locally near home the last hour and had a few mystery bites plus caught a couple big Jack’s and sharks. But that was it and the jet skis we’re absolutely ridiculous 😒. Back at it tomorrow have the same crew for 3 days we may mix it up some but looks like nice weather and should be good fishing!  4 for 15

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing

Thomas got to pull on some big tarpon today! The winds laid down nicely and it was a 180 from yesterday. We headed out early and found a big group of happy tarpon to start. First bait out we hooked a nice 150 lber within 5 minutes! We battled the fish for an hour and got her boatside several times. Thomas wanted to jump in and get a good shot with one, but I told him you really have to get lucky and get the right cooperative fish. This one eventually made one last hard run snapping the line. These big fish around the bridges are hard on our gear, so often it’s tough to get them to roll over as all you can do is pull hard. After that we left and tried another bridge. Again we hooked up pretty quick, and chased this fish down fast but he got us in the bridge and broke off after a few minutes. We set back up and them caught a big nurse shark. Things seemed to quiet down, so we moved around and then got on another pack of happy tarpon. We hooked one more that we chased into the bay, and had up to the boat again several times. Looked like we would roll this one over, pulled hard on the leader trying to stop her. But again one hard kick and she broke free! We set back up and then hooked another one about 20 minutes later. Again we got the fish chased down, in and out of the bridge. But eventually she swam in and we couldn’t stop her. After that we ran back towards home to try. Found a bunch more tarpon. No response so we moved around again, and had two more good zips on our baits. Not 💯 sure that they were tarpon, but definitely seemed like it with the pickup and run. Anyways we called it a day after that. 3 tarpon to the boat and a 4th we chased down before breaking us off, plus a couple more possible bites. Pretty good fishing, may tarpon fishing stays pretty hot! I’m off the next couple days hopefully getting my new boat soon. Looks like we have a nice stretch of weather, should keep the fish happy!  3 for 4

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing

Last day with John and Jan. Winds were howling a good 25 mph today mostly out of the east. Made for some blustery conditions out there. We decided to stay somewhat closer to home. We gave tarpon a whirl early on. Very tough conditions to fish, plus the sargasm weed was intense to say the last. Almost every bait you put out you were throwing it into patches of weed, so just a lot of clearing baits and not much clean fishing time for them. But we powered through and eventually got a few bites. Some sharks but then we jumped a tarpon! Soon after that a few more sharks, then finally John got hooked up on a nice 100 lb tarpon that we chased. A rough battle in choppy seas, but we got the fish boatside several times but he eventually went through the leader. Would’ve been tough to try to do much more with the fish with the rough conditions so we were happy with that, and got a few good jumping shots at least. After that we decided to leave the tarpon alone and went snapper fishing. Got our limit of nice snappers on cut bait and called it a day. Not too shabby and looks like it’ll be nicer for a while at least from what I see the next week they aren’t calling for more than 15 mph winds. Should be good for fishing. Back at it tomorrow they are saying we may get a little rain from this early tropical system thats developing, but I don’t think it’ll be too bad.  1 for 2

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing