Had Steve and Jim again for day 2 of meat fishing here in Islamorada. We stuck close to home since the bay was a little slow for us yesterday after snapper fishing. We found some good mangrove snappers on the patch reefs early on, our live pilchards treated us well and we got our limit in an hour or so. Jim got a real nice one the biggest of their trip, about 17 incher and 3 lbs. We also had some smaller groupers, and a few small muttons and lane snapper. Good action for sure! After that we tried a few local islamorada snook spots. Occasionally we get a few snook in certain areas close by, and with the pilchards you can actually catch them. No snook in the first stop but did get a grouper, but the second stop we hooked two snook and caught one and plenty of jack crevelle. After that we hit the bayside close by and caught plenty of spanish mackerel and more jacks. The boys didn’t care to eat mackerel though so we didn’t give that too long maybe 40 minutes. We hit another patch and found a few more lane snappers and a couple porgies, and plenty more mangrove snapper and other snappers too. Jim caught a bonnet head shark and then also hooked a big blacktip on his light rod that gave us several cool jumps and broke off. We also tried drifting our crabs for permit in a couple areas but no luck with that. But all in all a great day the boys had about 14 fish for dinner and to take home. I’ll be back at it tomorrow likely trying the mackerels and tarpon if they leave it up to me. Stay tuned!
Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing
