Capt. Rick Stanczyk's Islamorada Tarpon Fishing

What a day with Todd and Farrah Mitchum! They were visiting from the Carolinas and were suppose to fish with me a couple weeks ago. The big hurricane changed our plans though and luckily we were able to reschedule for today. We headed out early and found some bait right away. Had to work at it but caught what we needed. Using our power pole anchor and barracuda tackle net we made quick work of the bait. We headed straight out where I had found some tarpon yesterday. Saw a signs of them in the area but didn’t seem to be a big concentration, so we set up and gave it a whirl. Nothing in the first stop so we shuffled around and then we got a few bites. First one zipped us and we weren’t sure what it was but seemed tarpon-like. Then Farrah hooked a fish that we fought for a couple minutes but came unbuttoned. Then she finally got one that stayed on there, a nice 60 lber good size fish! We got him to the boat for some good pictures. After that things seemed to slow down so we moved again. Tried another area that was pretty hot last week, but today we did not see much there. No bites so we packed it up fairly quickly as I wasn’t seeing what I wanted to. I got word from my buddy that some fish were in an area we found them yesterday afternoon, so we high tailed it over that way. We pulled in and saw some fish right away – just what I hoped! We set up and soon Farrah was hooked up again with a nice 40 lb fish that she caught. Then we missed a couple and then it was Todds turn. He got a nice 60 lb fish as well. He had told me he’d only ever gotten one to the boat before, so we took our time and chased the fish down, and were rewarded with some good release photos. We got back in position and it didn’t take long, Farrah hooked and landed another, then a final one to finish our day. She really had the hot rod today, though that’s no surprise women always seem to! What a fun day and so glad to see the fishing so strong it really has been an unbelievable September. Extra glad it was good for these clients as I know the stresses of dealing with a hurricane aftermath from last year! I’m off for the next couple days headed to Miami, then back to work on Sunday hopefully the fish keep chewing. We do look to have some wind coming which may change things up somewhat. The only good thing is it’s a good direction, northeast, which may not bother things at all. I hope not as we are suppose to do a TV show next week! Give me a shout if you are wanting to get out in October, I think we will still have some good fishing up until it starts to really get cold.  5 for 9

Today I had Charlie out for a full day of fishing.  Tarpon was on his bucket list as was a larger size snook.  I told him tarpon fishing had been really good and we’d try for snook as well.  He also was hoping for some dinner fish and there had been some triple tails back there too.  We went after bait first, it wasn’t easy we didn’t get many where I’d been getting them the last couple days.  So we gave it 30 minutes there then ran to another spot.  Didn’t see much but eventually we found a good school in a channel.  Got two good throws and caught a couple dozen, enough for what we needed.  We tried an area for tarpon and where there may be large snook too, jumped off 1 tarpon then hooked some big sharks that cut us off.  I could see some tarpon off in the distance which looked like bigger ones so we moved out there.  Soon after we hooked a big 90 lb tarpon!  Charlie fought her well and we got some nice jump shots and boatside pictures.  After the 30 minute battle they seemed to be gone though.  We ran out where some smaller tarpon had been, didn’t see a whole lot but a handful.  Nothing in the first stop but the second stop we hooked a couple tarpon, jumped one off right away and another Charlie had on for a few minutes before he threw the hook.  We tried a few areas for snook after that with some pinfish we had without much luck.  Kind of muddy water in most those areas though it didn’t look great.  So we tried one last spot again where a big snook may of been.  Tide was starting in and after 20 minutes or so, Charlies rod took off!  He got a nice big 18 lb snook, a true trophy size one for Islamorada!  After that we looked for triple tails, we had seen some swimming around while tarpon fishing earlier but only got a couple shots on some which didn’t bite.  We didn’t see any now at this point where I had saw them yesterday, so we ran to check one more area.  No triple tails there, but a load of tarpon!  We had about 15 minutes left and I told Charlie we probably had a good shot at getting a tarpon, so we opted to try that and sure enough within about 5 minutes Charlie caught another 30 lb tarpon to finish the day.  Fun day and nice to cross a couple fish off his bucket list, and quality fish at that!  2 for 5

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

Got out with Eric and Justine today for a full day tarpon trip.  Eric really wanted a big tarpon and had caught some small ones before.  I told him we found some larger size ones yesterday though it wasn’t the time of year for the big migrating fish though could possibly get lucky.  Bait was a little tougher than yesterday but we managed to get what we needed plus some leftovers from yesterday.  We checked the area where we fished yesterday but did not see much in the AM there.  A couple fish after a long pass through, we did get one bite out of them we missed and then some big sharks.  But definitely not what was there yesterday.  We continued on and found some fish in the other area I’d been going too lately.  Not showing much but my tarpon senses led to believe they were there.  Sure enough we started getting bit up.  We were having trouble keeping them on but ended up landing 5 fish – 3 to the hand, 1 to the main leader, and 1 to the wind-on leader.  The rest kept flopping off every which way!  They bit right through the slack tide which was nice.  Also a few big sharks out there, a couple lemon sharks and blacktips.  Later on we decided to check that other area for the bigger fish again on the way home.  They were there now, we saw one jump and got set up and Justine jumped off a nice 60 lb fish!  After that we moved in further and saw some more, but no more response out of them.  Some more big black tips and did get a nice 11 lb tripletail to finish the day.  The banner fishing continues this September has been one for the ages!  Don’t sleep on this time of year, it’s a great time to come with very little fishing pressure and barring a hurricane, good calm conditions.  5 for 18

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