Fishing Islamorada

June has rolled by quickly and summer time tarpon fishing is in full swing.  That is still my focus this time of year and really all through the summer into September and even October.  This last month the fishing hasn’t been quite as consistent as it was in years past… really that’s been the case the last two years.  While this June was much better than last June by the catch numbers, it’s often been very ‘hit or miss.’  Meaning we’ve had days where we’ve done very well and caught multiple fish in a spot, then gone their the next day and not found a thing.   Most days we end up fishing hard and hitting multiple spots and usually end up finding a tarpon or two, but a handful of days we’ve been skunked though we’ve caught plenty of sharks while doing so to keep us busy.  Anyways fishing gets much more tough when things aren’t consistently reliable – instead of going to 1 spot to hook 3 or 4 tarpon, we are going to 3 or 4 spots to hook 1 tarpon.  This last week for instance we’ve had 3 separate days where we’ve landed 3 or more tarpon when we’ve gotten into the right spot, and in between those days we’ve had one day where we caught none, and a couple days where we only caught 1 each day.  The fish just seem to be moving around a lot though I’m hoping as we get into July the bite will get more consistent and fish will stay put in the channels for periods of time, rather than moving in and out by the day.  I haven’t been doing much else other than tarpon/shark fishing, though we did have a good day with snook about a week or so ago.  We landed 30 or so snook, 3 redfish, and on that day caught 4 tarpon… it was the last nice calm day we had – as it’s been blowing 15-20 or more all week since then, even getting up to 30 one day.  Unfortunately that’s had the bay all churned up the last week, so another reason why I think the tarpon have been a little more hit and miss.  Usually we have calm weather through the summer which means the water gets nice, clean, and pretty and the fish are usually much happier.  Hopefully as we get into July and August that will be the case.  Right now I have about half of July available for trips if anyone is looking to go.  It’s one of my favorite months for tarpon as the crowds die down and the everglades fishery usually turns on!  You often don’t see another boat out there as you battle the silver kings.  We also have good trout and snapper fishing in the bay if you are into that, sometimes you can mix and match fishing options if things cooperate well during the trip.  Anyways drop me a line if you are wanting to get out this summer!

P.S. For daily updated tarpon fishing reports, read my islamorada tarpon fishing blog.

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

Whew time is flying by this year it’s already mid May and we are getting into our ‘summer time’ tarpon fishing.  This is by far my favorite time of year for fishing here for tarpon… when the winds calm down, the weather heats up, and the crowds leave!  Tarpon fishing can be good all the way into October, last year as a matter of fact our best months were September and October believe it or not!  Though that isn’t to be expected, June, July, and usually a good part of August are still typically very good.  Tarpon has been what I’ve been after mostly the last couple months.  Fishing has been good overall, better than last year but not the best that I’ve ever seen.  Right now the full days are where it is at, as I’m making the run into the everglades national park to fish tarpon a lot of the time.  That usually takes an hour, and sometimes one tide is better than another, so having the full 8 hours gives you the opportunity to fish both in various areas.  We are just coming off the full moon which mixed things up a little bit, especially since we had a late cold front about a week ago too.  The fish are moving around a lot, we had a banner day yesterday and made it look easy, whereas today we struggled to catch a couple fish at the very end of the day finally!  It should get more consistent though as we get away from the moon and the weather stabilizes for good.  Hopefully it’s not like last year where it was windy all through the summer… that was terrible!  So far though May has been good overall, and I only see it getting better.  June is usually one of my best overall months for tarpon fishing, and July can be close behind it.  I still have quite a few days open in July if you are looking to fish, and don’t forget about the ‘fall bait run’ we get in October…  As I said last year October was one of the best months, and nobody was here at all so you really had the fishing all to yourself.  I am still dreaming about that last year it was such a fun month to fish here…

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

April is here and that usually means the start of ‘prime time’ tarpon season!  Fish have definitely shown up around many of the local bridges and channels.  However it has not been ‘red hot’ fishing all the time.  Being there at the right time in the right place seems to be key, and often there are little windows where they seem to be biting well so you hope to catch a fish during those times.  The last couple days we had pretty good fishing though we only ended up landing one tarpon.  Yesterday we probably had about eight bites on the falling tide in the late morning around the bridges.  But our baits were big and it was tough to get the hook in the tarpon but we finally did!  The day before we had jumped a couple tarpon off in the morning, and spent the rest of the day in the backcountry.  The backcountry fishing had been a little tough the last few days as we’ve had a stiff south breeze the last three days or so, and it really mudded up the backcountry and was even hard getting the sharks to bite whilst trying for tarpon.  We did catch some nice mangrove snappers back there on cut bait, and had plenty of action with trout too.  Speaking of trout several days ago we caught a nice 22 incher which was a great catch.  The day after that while it was still calm (before the south wind started cranking) we had a banner day with tarpon.  We ended up catching 6 with Jake and John Hess, it was just one of those perfect days.  So anyways as you can see the fishing has been up and down.  Right now we are having a late cold front smack us again so that will likely slow the tarpon bite down for a few days… It’s suppose to get down in the mid to low 60s so it’ll be about a 15 degree drop, hopefully it’ll warm right back up though.  I’m fairly booked up through the end of June but if you are looking to get out this summer it’s still a great time for tarpon and we usually have pretty good snook fishing too on our full day trips, drop me a line and we’ll get it set up!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

March is almost over and it’s started to really feel like tarpon season here in Islamorada.  I just got back on the water about a week ago after celebrating the birth of my son, Felix!  Mom and baby are healthy so we are thrilled about that.  Fishing has been pretty good, we had a hard cold snap while I was away that really chilled the water down, and it stayed chilly until just a few days ago really.  I know the tarpon fishing was tough while I was away, but now that it got warm again they’ve shown back up.  In the backcountry a few days ago it was flat calm for a couple days.  A horde of fish showed up from out in the gulf, and I’d guess numbers in the thousands – as far as you could see tarpon were rolling and busting.  We found them one afternoon, and quickly hooked and caught a 100 lber, but by the time we got done fighting him the tide had quit and it was time to go home.  The following day though we hammered them, and went 6 for 12 in about 3 1/2 hours!  The best day I’ve had in a while, and certainly for this year so far.  It was fun to see.  Though the next day after that the wind kicked up to 25 mph, and had to take a day off.  But yesterday and today it dropped down to 15-20 mph (and is going to continue to drop and be nice later this week!)  We caught two tarpon both yesterday and today, yesterday way out there in the backcountry and today locally around the channels and bridges in Islamorada.  We did see quite a few fish in the local areas, which I hadn’t seen until now, so that is a good sign too.  Other than tarpon, there were some nice sharks to be had.  We also got a cobia one day.  Plenty of trout still in the bays too along with ladyfish and a few snappers.  All in all it’s good fishing and hopefully this week will continue to be good – I have a feeling it will be with the weather and signs we are seeing.

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

Well I’ve still been pretty busy the last week though I’m taking this next week off expecting the birth of my first child!  We’re due today but got a feeling it may be a little big longer.  Fishing had been decent the last week though the last 3 days on the water I had (Saturday – Monday) were incredibly rough.  Over the weekend we got hit by a minor front, not much of a temperature swing, but it blew 30+ mph for 2 days.  Almost unfishable…  But we made it out and did some snapper fishing around the islands.  The weekend fishing was very good, both days we got our share of ‘jumbo’ snappers in the 18-20 inch range, I think a half dozen on Saturday, and 3 on Sunday, plus plenty of 12 inchers to limit out.  On Sunday we also caught a juvenile tarpon which was awesome!  Monday wasn’t quite as good, we were able to get our limit of snapper at least, but it was a struggle to get some barely over 10 inch legal ones.  Though we did catch a couple big sheepshead too, and had plenty of shots at juvenile tarpon but they showed us no love.  I noticed the water temperatures had dropped considerably with the wind and were in the high 60s, so I’m sure that definitely messed the bigger tarpon and sharks up for a few days.  At least the few guys I talked to that tried that stuff, didn’t have much success.  Before the bad weather, I had a great 3 days fishing with John and Jan Shulze.  We had one flat calm day where we caught plenty of mackerel, then looked for tripletail without much success (didn’t see a single one!), but we did come across a school of free jumping tarpon.  We spent the rest of the day after them, and landed two fish of about 80 lbs, one for each of them!  Plus plenty of sharks including a hammerhead.  Day 2 the winds started to kick up out of the north, but we made it into the bay and caught plenty of trout – it was almost every cast for about 2 hours!  Then we made our way into the everglades creeks and had a slow pick of fish, but some quality, including a nice redfish, a handful of snook (we lost a big one too!), and Jan jumped a nice 30 lb tarpon on light tackle.  The last day was the first snapper day that I mentioned.  So they got to see a little bit of everything fishing with me for three days.  Before that I had a couple of double half day trips and we caught a ton of mackerel on all those trips.  Anyways looking forward to having the week off and adding a new fisherman (or woman) to the family!  I’ll be back when I start fishing again.

Capt. Rick Stanczyk