Capt. Rick Stanczyk's Islamorada Tarpon Fishing

Got out with Butch and Cody today for a full day of fishing.  Part of a larger group that had several boats out of Bud n Marys.  We tarpon fished most of the day and they were game with that – anything beats being at work!  We caught some fresh mullet and headed out to the fishing grounds.  We tried where we fished the last few days and there were fish there.  We had a bite within 20 seconds of putting our first bait out, a big 100 lber for Cody!  Good fight and we had her on the leader several times but snapped off before we could get the boat side picture.  I thought the tarpon might be chewing a little bit seeing as how quickly we got a bite, but we fished hard for the next hour or two and never had another tarpon bite there.  We did get a nice bull shark for Butch though.  The tide started to die so we decided to run further back where I hadn’t been in a while though had seen some tarpon a couple weeks ago the last flat clam day we had.  We didn’t see much at first, and anchored randomly and caught a big lemon shark and a sting ray.  I was about to give up on the area, but decided to take a lap around and look.  We saw one little bust that I thought may be a tarpon and decided to fish the area.  It was near where we saw the tarpon a couple weeks ago, and I saw something float by with its fins up high.  We put a live bait out and sure enough a tarpon grabbed it!  We missed him but then caught one on our other rod, a nice 65 lber.  We moved around a bit, and then Butch had another bite he missed, and then 30 seconds or so before I was about to say reel ’em up, Butch hooked and landed a 40 lber!  Anyways a great day 3 tarpon in February is pretty good fishing!  Looks like the winds are going to kick up again so might slow the bite down a little more.  But I’ve already caught more fish this February then I have in any other February in the last several years.  May be a very early start to our season!  3 for 5

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

Got out for a 3/4 day with John, Michelle, and Phil.  Tarpon was on the agenda though they also wanted to do a little ‘action fishing’ too.  We did the mackerels early to start and had good luck with that.  We found some tarpon where they had been previously.  Today it was very flat calm though and looked to be a good slug of fish around.  We had the last of the falling tide though it was very weak and died early on us.  We sat for close to an hour and had a shark bite, then finally had something pick up our bait and swim it up under the boat.  I had Phil real on it and a nice tarpon came up jumping off our bow!  We had to quickly get the line out from under the boat and around the trolling motor, but managed to do it without losing the fish!  We chased him around a little bit and landed him!  Nice 85 lb fish though we didn’t get good boat side pics as he broke on the leader while Phil had him wrapped on the gloves.  We set back up and now the tide was coming in and moving pretty good.  We continued to see fish around us but they just weren’t super active feeding.  We had another shark bite us off and then we made a move.  We hooked another big lemon shark and while fighting that, Michelle hooked a smaller 50 lb tarpon!  We fought both for a bit and got the wind-on leader on the tarpon to the rod tip, but he jumped and threw the hook before we could really get him boat side.  Oh well a technical catch anyways.  We got the shark to the boat though.  After that it was about time to head on home, but a great day with variety and a couple tarpon!  I think I’ll be back at it tomorrow looks like we will have good weather for a few days, hopefully they’ll start perking up even more for us!  2 for 2

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

Got out with Howard and Mike, repeat customers from last year, for a full day of backcountry fishing.  We planned to mix it up a bit but tarpon was definitely on the list.  We caught pilchards to start our day and tried to get in on the little tarpon that were biting a few days before.  Today however it seemed to be a different day, the little tarpon were there but not feeding very actively.  We did manage a few mangrove snappers in that spot though.  We then hit the gulf to do some mackerel fishing and did OK with that and then went after some larger tarpon.  The tide was turned and coming in now as we got to the channels.  I didn’t see a whole lot of activity, we scoped out a few areas and I found one spot that I favored.  We set up and Howard ended up getting a nice cobia to start things off, about a 30 lber!  After that we saw a few tarpon free jump further down the channel so we packed up and moved.  Mike had a tarpon bite soon after, about a 40 lb fish not as big as we are use to this time of year.  Unfortunately he jumped towards the boat and never got the hook in a good spot.  A little later I think we had another tarpon zip us too but not sure exactly if it was.  Our sister boat though did catch a big 140 lb tarpon next to us they were fishing the same group as me.  We ended up catching a few more sharks and hooked what I think was a big sawfish, but he cut us off.  So the tarpon won today but we had some good action anyways and all around a great day.  Hopefully they’ll be more cooperative tomorrow!  0 for 1

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