Got out on a two boat trip today along with Capt. Mike Bassett. Tarpon was on the agenda and I had a good bit of bait from yesterday still. We found some tarpon in one of the backcountry channels and had caught the tide change. After 20 minutes it was coming in OK, tarpon were rolling frequently. We couldn’t get them to bite though, made a couple little moves but no luck. The sharks were active and we got some bonnet heads and a big lemon shark. We then ran further back and had to look around a little, but saw a few signs of them busting and splashing. Again had to make a couple moves, had fish literally jumping behind the boat, and finally got one to eat! Landed a nice 50 lb fish and then jumped off another one about 30 lbs. We also got some big sharks including a couple hammerheads, and had a triple tail eat our tarpon bait that we caught as well. We hit the channels on the way home again, and caught plenty of blacktips and then the last bait out we got a 90 lb tarpon to finish the day! All in all a great day, have the same crew tomorrow we are going to tarpon fish some and then mix it up with snook hopefully at the end of the day! 2 for 3
5/20/17 Florida Keys Tarpon Fishing in May
Got out with Matt Newman and his son Aiden today. We fished a 3/4 day and mixed it up a bit. Did snappers and trout early, and that was pretty good fishing. It was nice to not have to stress about catching tarpon after just fishing hard for them the last 5 days in not so great conditions especially the last 3 days! But we did give the tarpon a try for the last hour of the day. Set up near the bridge where we had hooked one late yesterday, and within 10 minutes or so, Aiden was on a nice 80 lb fish! Great fight and we landed him quickly in about 20 minutes or so. After that we fished a little longer but no more bites and headed home. It’s nice when fishing is easy and a plan comes together. Off tomorrow I think then fishing Monday through Thursday and out of town for the following weekend. Looks like it’ll be a good week or fishing with light winds. 1 for 1
5/19/17 May Tarpon Fishing in Islamorada Florida
Last day with Pete and crew today. We stayed local around town, winds were still kicking though not as bad as the last couple of days, 15-20 most of the day not 25+. Tides were still messed up from the hard winds and didn’t start/stop on schedule. We found some fish in a few spots early but they didn’t want to play. We finally had a little action later near afternoon time. We had one bite by a bridge but unfortunately it was hung in the bottom and the line got cut right when the fish took off and jumped. Later on the slack tide at another bridge, we had a nice 100+ lb fish eat though he went ballistic, charging the boat and then going the other way and jumping. Somehow the hook didn’t stay in him though, the line was chaffed about 2 feet up so he had swallowed the bait, but it all came out bait and all. Oh well, we were due to miss a few, the boys had caught fish on all 4 of the other trips and I think caught 9 in total in 5 days, not too bad considering the last 3 days were very tough conditions. Tomorrow I’m scheduled for a full day not sure what we are gonna fish for, then off sunday. Monday it looks like it’ll get nice again so hopefully we’ll have a good week of tarpon fishing. 0 for 2
