Got out for a busy week here again after a short vacation for the long weekend we had. I fished Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Unfortunately Thursday at the very end of our day my boat broke down and we were a good 30 miles away from home. Luckily we were able to find another guide heading home to assist taking my customer Rich back in to the dock and was able to get Capt. Steve to tow me in. But these things happen even in fairly new boats. Hoping to get that squared away today and back up and running next week. So on to the fishing I had James and Sam down for a couple days on Tuesday and Wednesday. It was Sams 16th birthday and within the first 20 minutes he hooked up to a nice 50 lb tarpon we got to the hand for pictures! Great way to start. We had another bite soon after I’m fairly sure (just zipped us really quick but seemed more tarpon-like than shark-like). Soon after that the tide changed we caught a few sharks including a big bull shark which was cool. The tarpon never really got going much after that though we fished hard on the incoming tide and tried a variety of things. But they just weren’t super happy. The following day we started with tarpon again. Had to jump around a few times but after an hour or so, James hooked up to a 100+ lber! Very good fish and we fought her hard for 45 minutes or so and got her to the hand too. Got a good pic and a healthy release of that fish. The tide had just quit by then too so we opted to do some light tackle stuff as the boys preferred that. Snook and redfish fishing was as good as I’ve seen it in a few years! We caught over 3 dozen fish in just a couple hours out of two different spots. This was great to see as much of our fishing the last year or two it’s really been just picking a handful of fish on any given spot and having to jump around a lot. Especially good to see considering all the cold weather we had just a couple weeks earlier. Yesterday I had Rich out and we tarpon fished as well. It was slow early on we moved 4 or 5 times and grinded hard for a couple hours. The tarpon were really spread out it seemed. We weren’t seeing too many jump around or marking any big groups of them, though they were around just not congregated very much. We finally got into a good looking area where I marked 4 or 5 and then it got crazy for a minute! We hooked a tarpon on a live pinfish, and as soon as we did we hooked another on our mullet. Rich fought the one on the pinfish and I had a feathered jig I was casting which I laid down to grab the other rod with the tarpon on it. That tarpon came off a few minutes later unfortunately but as soon as I set the jig rod down, it bent over too! I thought we had a triple header on for a minute and we did but the jig rod ended up being a big black drum. Crazy to just catch one randomly and on a feather with no bait on it! Rich landed his tarpon and then we set back up and hooked one more a bit later. But after that it was all over. There were a good 15-18 boats out there and I did not really see anyone else even hook a fish that I could tell. So again just right place, right time, it can happen and get crazy. But early season fishing you have to put the time in. We ended up catching a bunch of snook and a few other things including a baby tarpon in the creeks later on too, and then unfortunately broke down but at least we got our good day of fishing in and Rich was just a little later getting to the dock so could’ve been a lot worse.
Now with the weather change this week it’ll likely shut the tarpon down again I’m guessing until the following weekend or so. It’s forecast to get in the 40s possibly again so it’ll be pretty severe. Though all in all I think this will still be a good thing for our tarpon season as it’ll take the pressure off the early season fish for another week. Also as mentioned last week, the tarpon did start biting again even with the cooler water temps because the previous front the water got down to 50 degrees. So maybe they’ll start biting again even soon but time will tell. Anyways I’ve got days open the first couple weeks of March if anyone wants to get out let’s do it!
Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing
YouTube: Bud n’ Mary’s Marina
