Fished a full day today and stuck around town tarpon fishing for most of it. We had a couple bites earlier near home where I’ve been having some luck. Unfortunately both fish did not stick we jumped one off, the other we never saw but I assume tarpon. After that we ran down the road around the bridges. Lots of tarpon there again and lots of boats fishing. We managed to catch a couple, one exciting bite on live mullet and the other on dead. A 50 lb fish and then a nice 110 lb fish. They seemed a bit happier today we saw several other boats hook up, nobody was crushing them but at least they were biting a bit. The afternoon was slow we did spend an hour catching more bait, it was nice to see some mullet around as they’ve been scarce. They were not easy to catch but we spent an hour and got 30 or so. The afternoon back around home was slow just caught a big ray, saw a few tarpon roll in one channel but no bites. Tomorrow looks like the wind will swing back around to the easterly quadrant. That should be good news for all of us!
4/22/14 Early Morning Half Day Florida Keys Tarpon Fishing Charter Report
We got off the dock at 6:45 today. The wind was still northeast in the morning though died down to very light and variable later in the morning. The water is still a little chilly but should warm up today as the wind is light now. We caught a nice 120 lb tarpon in the first hour, a non jumper and did not get pictures myself. But a good hard fighter! We got some live mullet after that and ran down the road to the big bridges further south. Lots of tarpon down there, the channel was loaded up! They were not real happy though. We took a little while and finally had a couple cheap shots and then a solid bite. Caught a nice 85 lb fish. Out of the dozen or so boats there I only saw one other boat jump a fish. But there were hundreds of tarpon there. After that it was time to come in, maybe they will turn on this afternoon as they have the last few days. Oh well somebody else will find out! Not a bad morning two nice size tarpon. The florida keys tarpon fishing should get more consistent hopefully the winds will get back more to the east/southeast and it should be game on!
4/21/14 Tarpon fishing after the cold front still chilly but fishable!
It got chillier again last night down in the mid 60s and the water temps did dip to the mid 70s. Not terrible but when it goes from being in the low 80s to 76 the tarpon usually don’t like that too much. We were able to get one right off the bat and a possible other bite near home, a nice 50 lb fish to start the day. After that not much more action we ran further southwest by the bridges and caught a few decent size groupers, and a couple nurse sharks, but no tarpon action on the end of the falling tide. We ran back to fish the local channels and just more sharks and rays. We then ran back to the bridges to try to snapper fish and wait for the tide to start running in good. We caught a few snappers and saw some tarpon rolling so we put a bait out and eventually hooked a nice 35 lber that we caught. Saw a few more busting and rolling nearby so we set up over there and had a few other bites and couple cheap shots on the live baits, and finally hooked a nice 85 lber that we fought a while and landed. After that one other bite and that was about it a bunch of other boats came in and the tarpon seemed to settle down after being happy for a good hour or so anyways. Not a bad day with the conditions, north wind and chilly, 3 for 6!
