Capt. Rick Stanczyk's Islamorada Tarpon Fishing

Got out with Justin and Carol today down from NJ/Philly up in the northeast.  Justin wanted to catch a tarpon badly and we set off to do that this morning.  Got an early start like I wanted to yesterday, didn’t have the rain slow us down today thankfully.  We had good tide this time and got there to find some tarpon jumping around when we pulled up.  We set up and got a couple shark bites then proceeded to catch two big tarpon of about 100 lbs!  Justin and Carol each got one.  After that things slowed down a little, a few more sharks.  We could see more fish a little further down so we moved a bit.  Nothing much after that move, but we moved one more time and picked away at sharks, then Justin hooked another tarpon.  We got him near the boat with the wind-on leader to the rod tip for a technical catch, though he jumped and threw the hook so didn’t get him boatside.  The other fish too were wild and we had both up to the hand but they started going berserk and broke off before we could get boatside pictures.  Anyways it was a great day catching three tarpon, we stopped on the way home to catch a few trout and then some more mullet for the next trip.

I was taking tomorrow off but just opened myself up for a morning trip, it’s suppose to blow like crazy but if anyone wants to go we can give it a shot.  I’m also open Monday just got cancelled so if anyone is in town and wants to go fishing, drop me a line Monday will work!  3 for 3

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

Got out with Peter and Dave return customers down from NY.  It was a tough day for us we tried to leave early to catch the tide right but it was pouring rain all throughout the bay so we had to wait about 45 minutes before we got out.  Tried to fish locally where we found some hungry fish yesterday morning, and saw a couple, but no activity whatsoever… We then made the run into the backcountry, it was rough blowing 20 out of the east.  Though once we got out there it wasn’t too bad.  Set up and not much was going on but did see a couple tarpon jumping a couple hundred yards down so we moved down.  We ended up catching a couple small sharks but no tarpon bite, and the tide started to get weak on us.  Was hoping it would’ve lasted a while longer.  At this point the guys were thinking of cutting the day short, so we rushed back to try and just catch a few snappers for dinner.  Though they were even tough to get biting, we had about an hour and I tried 4 different spots and didn’t even get a bite though we saw some snappers swimming around.  Anyways, tough fishing after having good activity yesterday.  But we’ll give it a try again tomorrow I know I have a full day and we are dedicated to catching tarpon!  0 for 0

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

Got out with Brent and his son Colin today after some florida keys tarpon.  I had gone early looking for bait and we found a little bit, was able to catch a couple dozen I split with my partner so we had some good live baits when we got out.  Tried a local channel where we found a few fish rolling, but no bites.  We tried another and there the fish were much more active.  We had several bites and some cheap shots, before finally hooking into a nice fish.  Brent fought him well and he made some magnificent jumps and we landed him after about 20 minutes or so.  We went back and started to get rained on, then it got sunny.  We had one more cheap shot then it seemed like things had slowed down.  So we ran into the backcountry.  Tried a channel back there and didn’t have much action, caught a small shark and made a few moves.  Finally on our 3rd move we had a big tarpon bite but we missed him unfortunately.  After that the tide quit and we ventured even further to where we had had good fishing several days ago.  Tide was coming in good out there, but not much activity.  We moved around a couple times, and finally the sharks started to bite a little after almost an hour of fishing.  We caught several, then Colin had a good tarpon bite finally though unfortunately he came off the hook quickly as well.  That was about it we had a bit more rain then ventured back home.  The boys were good enough to let me stop and restock on bait for tomorrow, as we went through all my bait and even reserves today trying to catch that second fish!  Oh well it was good tarpon fishing and we landed one so I was happy.  Nothing done terribly wrong on the part of the anglers, just bad luck… some days they don’t wanna stay on the hook!  Hopefully tomorrow we see as much action.  Brent and Colin will be back next year for sure they said.  1 for 6

Capt. Rick Stanczyk