Capt. Rick Stanczyk's Islamorada Tarpon Fishing

Got out with Pat and Eric today for a full day.  We focused on a mixed bag type of day so tarpon definitely wasn’t the priority, but I did have some leftover bait from several days ago that I could put to use.  We went with our shrimp and pilcahrds and started the day fishing for snook and reds.  It was incredible we had non stop action for the first hour and a half, catching probably 40 or more total fish.  Then we found a few small tarpon that we tried messing with but no action out of them, one possible bite but I’m not sure what it was.  But we did catch a handful of nice trout.  Then we went offshore and did see a handful of bigger tarpon busting.  Not a ton but saw a few and tried it.  No bites here either but some big sharks, caught a big lemon and a big blacktip.  And also a couple triple tails that were floating by those were fun to catch!  We then did try a channel for the last hour of the day where a lot of tarpon were before this latest cold front came in.  Saw a handful here too, but no bites at all.  Anyways like I said it was still a stellar day with lots of variety and such, just no tarpon action.  With cool/cold fronts coming in the fishing for them will get hit and miss.  If we have warm stretches and calm weather it can definitely spark up and get good, if not then really it’s probably not worth focusing on – if you come across some and have the bait or set ups for it, then maybe try for a little while, but there are plenty of other things that are providing much better and consistent action for the next few months.  0 for 0

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

Got out with Brad and Lindsey for a half day.  We fish for snappers around some islands but I told them some small tarpon may be possible here too.  We caught our pilchards and headed out.  Snappers were pretty good, slow to start but got better with the tide change.  Then we got a nice little snook for Brad.  Then a little later, wham!  Tarpon on!  A nice little 10 lber but we got him to the boat for some pictures and released him unharmed.  After that we got a couple redfish to complete a backcountry SLAM – awesome!  Anyways very cool and nice half day.  Looks like we have a little weak cold front coming in tomorrow, it’ll be blowing hard west and then north on sunday as temperatures drop into the low 70s sunday night (lol).  Well it is a change for us as it’s been closer to 80 as a low and 90 during the day.  Fishing should start to change to fall/winter time stuff slowly.  Tarpon are still definitely possible as long as it doesn’t get real cold.  May be a little more hit and miss, but if you put the time in it can pay off.  But a lot of times, going for other things like snook etc… may pay off more and you still have shots at small tarpon while fishing for them.  But I always leave that up to my anglers.  1 for 1

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

Had Andrew, Jim, and Jay out again for Day 2.  They fished with me Friday and we had a good mixed bag day with snook, redfish, and finished the day with a small tarpon.  Today we focused on bigger tarpon.  Originally the forecast looked great it was suppose to be flat calm, however these weak cold fronts they never know what they’ll do, so it ended up being a little windy not too crazy but a solid 15 mph out of the north mostly.  My buddy gave me some bait yesterday afternoon so I felt confident that we’d have something at least, as the bait for big tarpon has been a little hit and miss as of late.  Of course we had no problem catching it after checking a few spots, but always nice to have that safety net to have a few left overs.  We loaded the bait well and then looked for tarpon.  Luckily for us they were right near where we caught our bait!  We had the last hour of falling tide and boy the water was super muddy from the wind a few days ago, also had a weird yellow tinge maybe algae related.  Tarpon were rolling and splashing around, I thought for sure it’d be red hot.  But we sat and never had a bite on the falling tide.  Waited for the tide to come in and moved around a bit, saw some more tarpon but still no response.  Made one more move and had them rolling there too, nothing!  The sharks did keep us busy though some lemons and blacktips.  It was hard to leave as every time I wanted to, another tarpon would roll right on top of our baits and we’d sit for a bit longer.  Must’ve happened at least a dozen times.  No bites though…. some days they do that, today really didn’t look like it was gonna be one of those days but they just weren’t into it.  We finally left and tried another area.  Saw a few splashed and a tarpon roll.  We set up and had another shark bite, then moved and after that we got lucky.  Jay hooked a big monster 120 lb tarpon that we fought and got on the leader in about 10 minutes!  A few good jumps to put on a show.  We leadered the fish but unfortunately with the tide into the wind, she made one good kick under the boat and cut off before we could get her to lay up for pictures.  So it goes with those big tarpon especially but we had her leader in hand for a legal catch.  We tried another channel after that, looked around hard but never for sure saw any tarpon there.  We blind fished and did catch a few more sharks.  Anyways a hard days work we definitely gave it 110% effort and were in fish most of the day, but sometimes you just can’t make them bite ravenously.  Good to still see such big groups of tarpon around though, it could still be worthwhile as long as the water temps stay in that 80 degree range.  Might have to work at it, but it’s doable.  Anyways I’m off the next couple days, then charters mid week again on Thursday… Another weak cold front coming in Friday, so wind may get funky on us but the calm before the storm could be good fishing!  Wednesday I’m available if anyone wants to go, it looks like it’ll be a nice day!  1 for 1

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