Got out with Rob and his sons today for some tarpon fishing in islamorada. We headed out early and I had bait leftover from the last couple of days. We focused on tarpon and we hit a channel I hadn’t fished in a little while to start. It paid off and within 15 minutes we had a nice tarpon on! After that it quieted down though we moved and caught a bunch of sharks, and then one more move without much of anything. Tide was still falling hard and I went and took a peek around some other channels further east near flamingo. Unfortunately with the hard south wind a few days ago, the water was still very very muddy and just didn’t look very fishy at all. So we didn’t even fish there just looked around but didn’t look worthwhile. We headed out west to try off the mainland. Saw a tarpon in one area as we were running, but tried fishing there without much luck. Then we headed out further and saw another one but this time there was a good pack of fish. We ended up catching three more and jumped a couple others off. All smaller fish in the 10 to 30 lb range, but lots of fun! We also caught several more sharks. Anyways glad we stuck with it sometimes thats what you have to do, especially this year it seems! Hopefully the wind will lay down one day and it’ll be like normal summer – one can always dream! So the ‘hit and miss’ pattern continues as I’ve been preaching on here, some consistency would be great. 4 for 6
6/22/17 June Tarpon Fishing Islamorada
Got out for an extended half day with Peter today. We weren’t going to focus on tarpon for long but did give it a good shot for the first hour of the day, which is when we had most of our action yesterday. We went to the same spot but unfortunately didn’t have a tarpon bite, though we did catch several sharks. Pretty much a perfect example of how the fishing has been the last month – catch ’em good one day, and then they are gone the next! Anyways after the hour had passed, the tide quit and we went and did some other stuff which wasn’t all that easy either but we did catch a few snappers for dinner and a couple trout and ladyfish. Full day focused on tarpon tomorrow, hopefully they will cooperate. 0 for 0
6/21/17 June Islamorada Tarpon Fishing Report
Got out for a full day with Paul and his father today. Winds were out of the south still a little windy, but not quite as crazy as yesterday. We tried to fish close early where I had been having luck the last several trips, however another boat had moved in on my spot and beat me out there. Wasn’t the start to my day that I wanted! Anyways we were going to move to another area in that spot but there was even a 2nd boat there now too, so I got frustrated and just left. We ran out into the backcountry and ended up getting lucky and finding a good school of tarpon in one of the channels. We caught one on the last of the falling tide, then as soon as it started in we had 3 more bites and landed 2 more. It was a great flurry of action and to be honest with it blowing 15-20 out of the south, I wasn’t expecting it to be so good but was really just hoping we’d get a bite or two throughout the day. Anyways after 9:30 it was over, we also had caught some sharks including a big nurse shark and bull shark, as well as blacktips and bonnetheads. W spent some time reupping on mullet as I went through all the bait I had, and we then fished another channel to finish it up. Made a couple moves in there but no more tarpon action, though we did catch plenty of blacktips. After that called it a day. Have a half day tomorrow but may just do some rod bending not sure yet. Looks like the winds will be steadily getting nicer as we get into the weekend, hopefully it’ll get 10 mph and under and the backcountry fishing will fire up more! 3 for 4
