Capt. Rick Stanczyk's Islamorada Tarpon Fishing

7/30/16 We got out early for some tarpon fishing.  I had some leftover bait so we were in good shape on that front.  The bait hasn’t been easy to get first thing in the morning, later on the incoming tide though there has been tons around.  So we often need to spend a little time later in the trip to resupply.  Anyways we caught 1 nice tarpon early around flamingo, had to move around a little but found a small group of fish in one of the channels.  Also caught some lemon sharks, rays, and blacktips.  After the tide turned we fished some other channels and found a good load of tarpon.  We caught another one a nice big 80 lb fish ( the other being 60ish).  Plus plenty more blacktips sharks.  And that was about the day we caught a little more bait before heading home for the following day.  2 for 2

8/1/16 – Today was very similar to yesterday though the winds started howling, blowing a solid 25 mph by late morning.  We found the tarpon in the same area as yesterday morning.  We ended up catching a couple and losing one more, plus plenty of sharks again including blacktips, lemon, and bonnetheads.  After the tide quit we tried to catch a few trout for dinner but with the ripping winds the bay was very muddy and not much activity doing that so we called it a day.  Anyways another great day landing a couple tarpon!  2 for 3

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

Went way into the backcountry since it was slick calm this morning and fished off the beaches.  Mullet were thick we must’ve caught close to 100 in a couple throws!  We didn’t see much for tarpon way out off the beaches.  Very strange this year it hasn’t gotten very good like it was for almost all of June and July last year.  A few days here and there but not much consistently though it was very windy for several weeks which is likely a big factor.  Today we looked hard and eventually saw a fish bust and ran close by and a few were rolling in the area.  Once we got positioned right we had bites pretty quick, unfortunately they didn’t stay buttoned.  We jumped one off, had one steal a bait, and had the line break on another.  Just one of those days!  The sharks ate us up and we caught plenty of them.  Eventually after jumping around a couple times we got one tarpon to stick that we landed though he pulled off with the leader in hand.  Anyways after that it dried up we tried another area and more shark activity.  1 for 4

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

Got out today for some more late july tarpon fishing in islamorada with Mike over from the west coast of california. We got out early and caught bait right away which was easy again.  Found tarpon in the same channels as the day before, however today they weren’t very happy.  We jumped around several times and just couldn’t get a bite out of them, fishing the last couple hours of incoming tide.  The old saying ‘no good deed goes unpunished’ played itself out as we watched a fellow captain catch one who I had clued in on the fish the night before.  Anyways that is the way the cookie crumbles!  Afterwards we fished several other areas and found tarpon in one other spot but they wouldn’t eat.  We caught several sharks including a hammerhead which was cool.  Finally the last stop of the morning with the tide falling now, we gave it a little extra time we got a nice 80 lb tarpon.  A nice way to end the day in a spot I hadn’t fished in a long time, glad it paid off!  1 for 1